area handbook series 

Thailand 

a country study 



Thailand 

a country study 



Federal Research Division 
Library of Congress 
Edited by 
Barbara Leitch LePoer 
Research Completed 
September 1987 




On the cover: Wat Phra Keo (Temple of the Emerald 

Buddha) on the grounds of the Grand Palace in Bangkok; 
illustration by Teresa Kamp 



Sixth Edition, First Printing, 1989. 

Copyright ®1989 United States Government as represented by 
the Secretary of the Army. All rights reserved. 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data 

Thailand: A Country Study 

(Area handbook series) (DA Pam; 550-53) 
Research completed November 1987. 
Bibliography: pp. 313-346. 
Includes index. 

Supt. of Docs, no.: D 101.22:550-53/987 

1. Thailand. I. LePoer, Barbara Leitch, 1941- 
II. Library of Congress. Federal Research Division. III. Series. 
IV. Series: DA Pam; 550-53. 

DS563.5.T4563 1989 959.3 88-600485 



Headquarters, Department of the Army 
DA Pam 550-53 



For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office 
Washington, D.C. 20402 



Foreword 



This volume is one in a continuing series of books now being 
prepared by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Con- 
gress under the Country Studies — Area Handbook Program. The 
last page of this book lists the other published studies. 

Most books in the series deal with a particular foreign country, 
describing and analyzing its political, economic, social, and national 
security systems and institutions, and examining the interrelation- 
ships of those systems and the ways they are shaped by cultural 
factors. Each study is written by a multidisciplinary team of social 
scientists. The authors seek to provide a basic understanding of 
the observed society, striving for a dynamic rather than a static 
portrayal. Particular attention is devoted to the people who make 
up the society, their origins, dominant beliefs and values, their com- 
mon interests and the issues on which they are divided, the nature 
and extent of their involvement with national institutions, and their 
attitudes toward each other and toward their social system and 
political order. 

The books represent the analysis of the authors and should not 
be construed as an expression of an official United States govern- 
ment position, policy, or decision. The authors have sought to 
adhere to accepted standards of scholarly objectivity. Corrections, 
additions, and suggestions for changes from readers will be wel- 
comed for use in future editions. 

Louis R. Mortimer 
Acting Chief 

Federal Research Division 
Library of Congress 
Washington, D.C. 20540 



iii 



Acknowledgments 



The editor and authors are grateful to numerous individuals in 
the international community, in various agencies of the United 
States government, and in private organizations who gave of their 
time, research materials, and special knowledge to provide data 
and perspective for this study. 

The authors also wish to express their appreciation to staff mem- 
bers of the Federal Research Division, Library of Congress, whose 
high standards and dedication helped shape this volume. These 
include Martha E. Hopkins, who managed editing and book 
production, as well as editing portions of the text, Marilyn L. 
Majeska, who edited parts of the manuscript and the accompany- 
ing figures and tables, and editorial assistants Barbara Edgerton 
and Izella Watson. David P. Cabitto and Kimberly A. Lord pre- 
pared the book's graphics, Susan M. Lender reviewed the maps, 
and Arvies J. Staton contributed to the charts on military rank and 
insignia. 

The following individuals are gratefully acknowledged as well: 
Ruth Nieland, Vincent Ercolano, and Mary Ann Saour for edit- 
ing various chapters; Catherine Schwartzstein for the final prepub- 
lication editorial review; Shirley Kessell of Communicators 
Connection for preparing the index; and Malinda B. Neale of the 
Printing and Processing Section, Library of Congress, for photo- 
typesetting, under the direction of Peggy Pixley. Special thanks 
go to Teresa E. Kamp, who designed the illustrations for the cover 
of the volume and the title pages of the chapters. The inclusion 
of photographs in this book was made possible by the generosity 
of various individuals and public and private agencies. 

Finally, the editor and authors wish to thank Federal Research 
Division staff members Mervin J. Shello and Ly H. Burnham for 
sharing their expertise in telecommunications and demography; 
Tracy M. Henry for her assistance in word processing; Meridel M. 
Jackson for her economic insights and computer expertise; and 
Russell R. Ross, Robert L. Worden, and Richard F. Nyrop for 
reviewing all parts of the book. 



v 



Contents 



Page 



Foreword Ill 

Acknowledgments v 

Preface xi 

Country Profile xiii 

Introduction xxi 

Chapter 1. Historical Setting 1 

Donald M. Seekins 

EARLY HISTORY 4 

The Mon and the Khmer 7 

The Tai People: Origins and Migrations 9 

Sukhothai 10 

THE AYUTTHAYA ERA, 1350-1767 10 

Thai Kingship 13 

Social and Political Development 13 

Economic Development 15 

Contacts with the West 17 

Ayutthaya: The Final Phase 18 

THE BANGKOK PERIOD, 1767-1932 18 

The Chakkri Dynasty 19 

Mongkut's Opening to the West 20 

Chulalongkorn's Reforms 21 

The Crisis of 1893 22 

BEGINNING OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL ERA 25 

1932 Coup 26 

Phibun and the Nationalist Regime 28 

World War II 29 

Pridi and the Civilian Regime, 1944-47 30 

RETURN OF PHIBUN AND THE MILITARY 32 

November 1947 Coup 33 

November 1951 Coup 34 

Phibun's Experiment with 'Democracy' 36 

SARIT AND THANOM 37 

Sarit's Return 37 

Thai Politics and Foreign Policy, 1963-71 39 

November 1971 Coup 42 



vii 



THAILAND IN TRANSITION 42 

MILITARY RULE AND LIMITED PARLIAMENTARY 

GOVERNMENT, 1976-83 48 

Prem in Power 49 

Foreign Relations, 1977-83 52 

Chapter 2. The Society and Its Environment .... 55 

William P. Tuchrello 

PHYSICAL SETTING 60 

Boundaries 60 

Topography and Drainage 61 

POPULATION i 65 

ETHNICITY, REGIONALISM, AND LANGUAGE 69 

The Thai and Other Tai-Speaking Peoples 70 

The Non-Tai Minorities 74 

Ethnic and Regional Relations 81 

THE SOCIAL SYSTEM 83 

Rural Social Patterns 85 

National and Urban Structures: Class and Status .... 90 

RELIGION 96 

Historical Background 97 

Buddhist Doctrine and Popular Religion 99 

The Sangha 103 

Buddhism, Politics, and Values 104 

Religious Minorities 107 

EDUCATION AND THE ARTS 109 

HEALTH AND WELFARE 113 

THE INDOCHINESE REFUGEE QUESTION 115 

Chapter 3. The Economy 121 

Andrew Cao 

ECONOMIC AND FINANCIAL DEVELOPMENT 124 

Public Finance 125 

Money and Banking 127 

Employment and Wages 132 

INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND FINANCE 133 

International Trade 133 

External Debt 138 

INDUSTRY 139 

Manufacturing 139 

Industrial Policy 142 

AGRICULTURE 144 

Land Use and Soils 146 

Land Tenure 147 



vm 



Tenancy and Land Reform 149 

Irrigation 153 

Crops 155 

Livestock and Poultry 160 

FISHERIES 161 

FORESTRY 162 

MINING 165 

TRANSPORTATION 168 

Inland Waterways 168 

Railroads 171 

Roads 172 

Ports and Shipping 173 

Civil Aviation 174 

ENERGY 175 

Electric Power 175 

Petroleum and Natural Gas 178 

TELECOMMUNICATIONS 179 

Chapter 4. Government and Politics 181 

Rinn-Sup Shinn 

THE CONSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK 185 

THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT 186 

The King , 186 

National Assembly 187 

Council of Ministers 191 

Judiciary 193 

LOCAL GOVERNMENT 194 

CIVIL SERVICE 197 

THE MEDIA 198 

POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS, 1980-87 201 

POLITICAL PARTIES 210 

FOREIGN AFFAIRS 214 

Background 214 

Foreign Relations since 1980 218 

Chapter 5. National Security 225 

John B. Haseman 

STATE OF NATIONAL SECURITY 228 

Insurgency 228 

Potential External Threats 233 

THE ARMED FORCES 239 

General Development 240 

Place in National Life 242 

Foreign Security Assistance 251 



ix 



Military Structure 254 

Training 263 

Uniform, Ranks, and Insignia 265 

INTERNAL SECURITY SYSTEM 268 

Police and Paramilitary Forces 270 

Criminal Justice 275 

Criminal Activity and the Narcotics Trade 281 

Appendix. Tables 287 

Bibliography 313 

Glossary 347 

Index 351 

List of Figures 

1 Thailand, 1987 xx 

2 Southeast Asian Region, 1987 6 

3 Centers of Power in Southeast Asia, Second to 

Thirteenth Centuries 8 

4 Origin and Range of the Tai Peoples in Southeast Asia, 

Thirteenth Century 12 

5 Centers of Power, Thirteenth to Eighteenth Centuries 16 

6 Siam in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth 

Centuries 24 

7 Topography and Drainage 64 

8 Regions and Provinces, 1987 66 

9 Distribution of Population, 1980 68 

10 Distribution of Selected Ethnolinguistic and Regional 

Groups 76 

11 Transportation System, 1987 170 

12 The Governmental System of Thailand, 1987 188 

13 Areas of Insurgent and Separatist Activity, 1987 234 

14 Areas of External Threat and Instability, 1987 238 

15 High Command of the Royal Thai Armed Forces, 1987 . . . 256 

16 Field Command of the Royal Thai Armed Forces, 1987 . . . 258 

17 Major Thai Military Installations, 1987 260 

18 Officer Rank Insignia, 1987 266 

19 Enlisted Rank Insignia, 1987 267 

20 Organization of the Thailand National Police 

Department, 1987 272 



x 



Preface 



The Area Handbook for Thailand, first published in 1971, was re- 
vised in 1981 as Thailand: A Country Study. This volume, a revision 
of the 1981 edition, recounts developments in Thailand during the 
1980s, a period of relative political stability and respectable eco- 
nomic growth. Recently Thailand's attention has focused increas- 
ingly on regional concerns as, in concert with other members of 
the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), it has 
attempted to deal with the problem of the Vietnamese occupation 
of Cambodia. 

Like its predecessors, this study is an attempt to present an objec- 
tive and concise account of the dominant social, economic, poli- 
tical, and national security concerns of contemporary Thailand, 
as well as to provide a historical framework for this overview. The 
1981 edition, which this volume replaces, was prepared by a team 
composed of Robert Rinehart, Irving Kaplan, Donald P. Whitaker, 
Rinn-Sup Shinn, and Harold D. Nelson and led by Frederica M. 
Bunge. 

The current Thailand: A Country Study results from the combined 
efforts of a multidisciplinary team. The authors obtained informa- 
tion from a variety of sources, including scholarly studies, official 
reports of government and international organizations, and for- 
eign and domestic newspapers and periodicals. Brief commentary 
on some of the more useful and readily accessible English-language 
sources appears at the end of each chapter. Full references to these 
and other sources used by the authors are listed in the Bibliography. 

The authors have tried to limit the use of foreign and technical 
terms, which are defined when they first appear in the study. Read- 
ers are also referred to the Glossary at the back of the book. In 
general, Thai personal names conform to the system of romaniza- 
tion followed by the Library of Congress. Certain exceptions have 
been made, including names of the monarchs of the Chakkri 
Dynasty (see table 2, Appendix) and those of certain other per- 
sons more familiar to Western readers in variant forms. Some 
religious and social terms are given in Thai; others are in Sanskrit, 
following usage in Webster's Third New International Dictionary 
(unabridged edition), or in Pali, the language of Theravada Bud- 
dhist scriptures. Contemporary place-names used in this study are 
those approved by the United States Board on Geographic Names. 
All measurements are given in the metric system (see table 1, 
Appendix). 



XI 



Country Profile 




Country 

Formal Name: Kingdom of Thailand. 
Short Form: Thailand (formerly Siam). 
Term for Citizens: Thai. 
Capital: Bangkok. 

Geography 

Size: Approximately 514,000 square kilometers. 

Topography: Chief topographic features include central plain 
dominated by Mae Nam (river) Chao Phraya and its tributaries. 
To northeast rises dry, undulating Khorat Plateau bordered on east 



Xlll 



by Mekong River. Mountains along northern and western bor- 
ders with Burma extend south into narrow, largely rain-forested 
Malay Peninsula. Network of rivers and canals associated with 
northern mountains and central plain drain, via Chao Phraya, into 
Gulf of Thailand. Mae Nam Mun and other northeastern streams 
drain via Mekong into South China Sea. Soils vary. Topography 
and drainage define four regions: North, Northeast, Center, and 
South. 

Climate: Tropical monsoon climate. Southwest monsoons arriv- 
ing between May and July signal start of rainy season lasting until 
October. Cycle reverses with northeast monsoon in November and 
December, ushering in dry season. Cooler temperatures give way 
to extremely hot, dry weather March through May. In general, 
rainfall heaviest in South, lightest in Northeast. 

Society 

Population: About 53 million in 1987; 1.9 percent annual growth 
rate in 1986, down from 3.1 in 1960 and 2.5 in late 1970s. Level 
of urbanization 17 percent in 1987, mostly concentrated in capital 
region. Bangkok metropolitan area population estimated at 5.5 mil- 
lion in 1987; ten next largest cities range between 80,000 and 
110,000 in population. Overall density 100.5 persons per square 
kilometer in 1987, varying from 62 in Chiang Mai Province to 3,292 
in Bangkok. 

Languages: More than 85 percent of population speak dialect of 
Thai (a member of Tai language family); most prevalent are Thai- 
Lao, spoken in Northeast, and Central Thai, which is official lan- 
guage taught in schools and used in government. Other languages 
spoken by members of ethnic minorities include Chinese (chiefly 
Teochiu), Malay, Karen, and Khmer. Smaller groups speak Tai 
languages such as Shan, Lua, and Phutai. Many minority peo- 
ples, especially Chinese, also speak Thai. 

Ethnic and Regional Groups: Four regional categories make up 
core Thai population: Central Thai (32 percent); Thai-Lao (30 per- 
cent); Northern Thai (17 percent); and Southern Thai (5 percent). 
Largest minority consists of Chinese (11 percent), followed by 
Malay (3-4 percent), and Khmer (1 percent). Remaining minor- 
ity groups, including numerous hill tribes, together constituted no 
more than 2 percent of the population. 

Religion: Almost all core Thai, some other Tai speakers, Khmer, 
and Mon practice Theravada Buddhism. Islam represented chiefly 
among Malay. Christians found among hill peoples and Vietnamese. 



xiv 



Education: Government supports universal free primary educa- 
tion. Most children attend school several years at least, and more 
than 85 percent of population literate. Fewer than three out of ten 
children continue beyond elementary level. More than a dozen 
universities and specialized postsecondary institutions provide 
higher education for about 3 percent of youth. 

Health: Access to modern medical care and trained physicians 
chiefly in Bangkok and provincial towns, although government 
developing rural health centers. Unavailability of potable water for 
most of rural population contributes to disease. In 1986 life expec- 
tancy at birth sixty-one years for men, sixty-five years for women. 

Economy 

Salient Features: Mixed economy includes both strong private sec- 
tor and state enterprises; government assumes responsibility for 
general infrastructure development. Basically capitalist, commit- 
ted to free trade. Rapid economic development of 1960s and 1970s 
slowed by worldwide recession of early 1980s. Strong recovery by 
1987. Bangkok metropolitan area faced problems of rapid modern- 
ization, including housing shortages and pressure on such basic 
services as water, sewage, and health care. 

Agriculture: Food surpluses produced by dominant agricultural 
sector of enterprising, independent smallholders. About 69 per- 
cent of labor force engaged in sector, and nearly 80 percent of popu- 
lation dependent on it for livelihood in the mid-1980s. Agricultural 
commodities accounted for some 60 percent of export values in late 
1980s. Major crops included rice, maize, cassava, rubber, sugar- 
cane, coconuts, cotton, kenaf, and tobacco. Forest cover decreased 
from more than 50 percent in 1961 to less than 30 percent in 1987. 
Fisheries important for food supply and foreign exchange earnings. 

Industry: Modern enterprises mainly concentrated in Bangkok and 
surrounding provinces. Majority Thai owned, but joint foreign ven- 
tures numerous; state enterprises form important segment. In late 
1980s, sector accounted for roughly 20 percent of gross domestic 
product (GDP) and 30 percent of total exports. Main categories 
of manufacturing included food and beverages, textiles and apparel, 
and wood and mineral products. Mineral resources contributed 
about 2 percent to gross national product (GNP) and included tin, 
tungsten, fluorite, antimony, and precious stones, all significant 
foreign exchange earners. 

Energy Sources: Exploited domestic resources include small oil 
fields, large lignite deposits, natural gas in Gulf of Thailand, and 



xv 



hydroelectric power. Extensive, largely unevaluated oil shale 
deposits also identified, but exploitation economically infeasible in 
1980s. Thermal (oil, natural gas, and lignite) power generation 
accounted for about 70 percent of total 7,570 megawatt installed 
generating capacity in 1986; hydropower, which remained largely 
unexploited, supplied about 30 percent. Electricity generally avail- 
able in Bangkok metropolitan area and in about 43,000 of nation's 
some 48,000 villages (mostly near Bangkok). Rural program under 
way for electrification of remaining villages by late 1990s. 

Foreign Trade: Major exports primary and processed agricultural 
products, tin, clothing, and other manufactured consumer goods. 
Major imports capital goods, intermediate products, and raw 
materials; petroleum products largest single import by monetary 
value since mid-1970s. Largest trading partners Japan and United 
States; trade with Japan characterized by large deficit. 

Transportation and Communications 

Railroads: Main lines (4,000 kilometers of track) originating in 
Bangkok run to national borders with Malaysia in south, Cambodia 
in east, and Laos in northeast; a northern line goes to Chiang Mai. 
Railroads remained important in 1987 for transport of bulk com- 
modities and passengers despite heavy inroads by truck and bus 
transport. 

Roads: Primary network of national highways (20,000 kilometers), 
more than 90 percent paved. Secondary system of provincial roads 
(more than 24,000 kilometers) — many impassable in rainy 
season — tie provincial towns and population centers to national 
highway system. Village roads, tracks, and footpaths totaled 
between 40,000 and 60,000 kilometers. Motor vehicles registered 
in 1984 included 688,000 automobiles (most in Bangkok metropoli- 
tan area), 600,000 commercial vehicles, and nearly 2 million motor- 
cycles. 

Inland Waterways: Extensive network of waterways formed by 
rivers and canals of central plain and Chao Phraya Delta carry pas- 
sengers and extensive quantities of rice and other freight. Naviga- 
ble by barge to Uttaradit in rainy season and to Nakhon Sawan 
in dry season. 

Maritime Shipping: Bangkok, preeminent port, handled about 
98 percent of imports, 65 percent of exports, and about 40 percent 
of coastal traffic in the mid-1980s. Some thirty small ports along 
Gulf of Thailand and Andaman Sea. Merchant fleet in international 



xvi 



service in 1985 totaled about 100 freighters, tankers, and bulk car- 
riers. Unknown number of small coastal craft supported trade with 
Malaysia and Singapore. 

Civil Aviation: Domestic air service to about twenty cities and 
towns throughout country and also flights to Penang, Vientiane, 
and Hanoi in late 1980s. International service provided by Thai 
Airways International (THAI) from Bangkok and Chiang Mai to 
Asia, Middle East, Europe, North America, and Australia. About 
forty international airlines also served Thailand. Bangkok main 
air traffic center for Asia-Europe flights. 

Telecommunications: By mid-1980s about 560,000 telephones (70 
percent located in Bangkok), 275 radio stations, nearly 8 million 
radio receivers, 9 television stations (all color), and more than 3 
million television sets. 

Government and Politics 

Party and Government: Constitutional monarchy established 
1932. King Bhumibol Adulyadej (1946- ) formally reigns over 
highly centralized unitary state, but real decision making in affairs 
of state rests with prime minister, in late 1987 General Prem 
Tinsulanonda. Prime minister need not be elected member of Na- 
tional Assembly, the national legislature; can assume position solely 
by assertion of leadership, with his role subsequently legitimized 
through pro forma royal appointment. Governmental system based 
on Constitution promulgated in December 1978 and divided into 
executive, bicameral legislature (House of Representatives and 
Senate), and judiciary. Multiparty system with sixteen parties par- 
ticipating in 1986 election; partisan politics gaining in importance 
but still largely a function of personalities. Practical politics con- 
fined mostly to members of military-bureaucratic elites and their 
supporters. 

Administrative Divisions: Country divided into seventy- three 
provinces (changwat); subdivisions include districts (amphoe), sub- 
districts (king amphoe), communes (tambon), villages (muban), and 
municipalities (tesaban). 

Judicial System: Judiciary consists of Supreme Court, Court of 
Appeal, magistrates' courts, labor and juvenile courts, and courts 
of first instance. Judges appointed and removed only with approval 
of Judicial Service Commission, which exercises jurisdiction over 
courts. Ministry of Justice appoints and supervises administrative 
personnel and determines matters of judicial procedure. 



xvn 



Foreign Affairs: Strong interest shown in development of mul- 
tilateral relations with neighboring countries through Association 
of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN); in early 1987, major con- 
cern of Thailand and ASEAN was continuing presence of Viet- 
namese troops in Cambodia. 

National Security 

Armed Forces: Total personnel strength about 273,000 in 
mid- 198 7; components were Royal Thai Army (190,000), Royal 
Thai Navy (40,000, including 20,000 marines), and Royal Thai 
Air Force (43,000). Conscription law required 2 years' military 
service by male citizens between ages of 21 and 30, except those 
granted exemptions for variety of reasons; about 30,000 inducted 
annually. Reserves totaled approximately 500,000, most having 
served in army. 

Combat Units and Major Equipment: Army organized into seven 
infantry divisions (including five tank battalions), one armored di- 
vision, one cavalry division (with an armor capability), eight in- 
dependent infantry battalions, two special forces divisions, one field 
artillery division, and one air defense artillery division. Naval com- 
bat forces included Royal Fleet of some 150 vessels and brigade 
of Royal Thai Marine Corps composed of one artillery battalion, 
six infantry battalions, and one amphibious assault battalion. Air 
force consisted of one forward ground attack squadron, two fighter- 
interceptor squadrons, one armed reconnaissance squadron, three 
transport squadrons, one utility squadron, two helicopter squad- 
rons, one training squadron, seven counterinsurgency squadrons, 
and four battalions of airfield defense troops. Equipment inven- 
tory included about 150 combat and 100 support aircraft. Com- 
bat aircraft included thirty-eight F-5E and F-5F fighter-bombers; 
twelve F-16 fighters scheduled for delivery in 1988. In 1987 bulk 
of armored fighting vehicles, artillery, missiles, aircraft, and naval 
vessels provided by United States; additional sources included Brit- 
ain, Italy, Israel, Canada, France, Indonesia, Japan, and New 
Zealand. Domestic arms industry growing rapidly. 

Military Budget: In the mid-1980s, outlays for national defense, 
including internal security costs, averaged about 30 percent of total 
annual government expenditures and about 4.2 percent of GNP. 

Police Agencies and Paramilitary Forces: Thailand National 
Police Department total personnel strength about 110,000 in 1987; 
major operational components included Provincial Police, 
Metropolitan Police, Border Patrol Police (BPP), and Central 



xvm 



Investigation Bureau. Paramilitary forces included BPP and civilian 
militia-like Volunteer Defense Corps; both used in suppressing 
armed insurgency supported by Communist Party of Thailand. 

Foreign Military Alliances: United States remained committed 
to Thai security under Rusk-Thanat agreement of 1962 between 
United States and Thailand. 



xix 




XX 



Introduction 



A STABLE AND PROSPERING NATION located in the heart 
of mainland Southeast Asia, Thailand faced the 1990s with abun- 
dant resources, not the least of which was its people. Thai society 
was characterized by a rich blend of cultural traits, an open- 
ness to new ideas, and a high degree of adaptability to new situa- 
tions. Despite a certain amount of diversity, Thai society, according 
to many observers, was bound together by three basic tenets: 
Theravada Buddhism, support for the Thai monarchy, and pride 
of citizenship in the only nation in Southeast Asia to have main- 
tained its independence throughout its history, including the colonial 
era (see fig. 1). 

Centuries of migration of various peoples into the region cen- 
tered on the valley of the Mae Nam (river) Chao Phraya, followed 
by decades of conscious nation building by the rulers of the Chakkri 
Dynasty, had resulted in a relatively homogeneous society based 
on a wide range of cultural influences. The majority of the populace 
could trace its lineage over the centuries to the Tai peoples (see 
Glossary) who inhabited southern China in the first millennium 
A.D. Forced southward by the pressure of an expanding Chinese 
empire, bands of Tai filtered into Southeast Asia interacting with 
other ethnic groups that had preceded them. By the late thirteenth 
century, the Tai states of Sukhothai and Lan Na had been founded 
in regions previously ruled by the Khmer and the Mon, respec- 
tively. Through interaction with these two peoples, the Tai were 
exposed to the culture, religion, arts, and languages of India. The 
Hindu-Buddhist traditions of neighboring Mon and Khmer king- 
doms strongly influenced the development of the Tai concept of 
kingship. 

Following the fourteenth-century relocation of the Sukhothai cap- 
ital southward to Ayutthaya on the floodplain of the Chao Phraya, 
Theravada Buddhism was made the state religion. The Ayutthaya 
kings gradually extended their suzerainty southward into the Malay 
Peninsula in the fifteenth century, where their expansion was 
stopped by the Muslim state of Malacca. To the east, Ayutthaya 
established intermittent control over the old Khmer Empire. The 
sixteenth to eighteenth centuries were marked by frequent wars 
with the Burmese kingdoms to the northwest, culminating in the 
destruction of the capital of Ayutthaya by the Burmese in 1767. 
Out of the ashes of Ayutthaya arose a new Tai kingdom centered 
at Thon Buri on the Chao Phraya Delta. In the following century 



xxi 



the rulers of the Chakkri Dynasty, having moved the capital across 
the river to Bangkok, expanded their control over neighboring Tai 
principalities centered at Chiang Mai to the north and Vientiane 
and Luang Prabang to the east. The new kingdom, known as Siam, 
also established a tributary relationship over the Khmers of Cam- 
bodia. Trade with China and India was greatly expanded, and 
Siamese control was established over many of the trade depots of 
the Malay Peninsula. 

The economy of Siam, as that of its predecessers, Ayutthaya and 
Sukhothai, was based on wet-rice agriculture. The peasantry, who 
worked not only their own rice fields but also performed service 
for a lord or patron under a system known as sakdi na (see Glos- 
sary), made up the vast majority of the population. Rice produc- 
tion was greatly increased in the second half of the nineteenth 
century as new lands were cultivated by an expanding peasantry. 
By the end of the century, Siam was a major rice-exporting coun- 
try, with most exports going to India and China. Jobs associated 
with the rice trade — merchants, millers, and stevedores — were filled 
by Chinese immigrants, who increasingly flooded into the region 
from southeastern China after 1850. Many Chinese also entered 
the lower echelons of the Siamese civil service at that time. 

The international side of Siam's rice trade was largely handled 
by Western merchants. European traders and missionaries had 
made their way to the Tai court at Ayutthaya as early as the six- 
teenth century. Substantial Western impact on Siam, however, 
began with the reign of King Mongkut (Rama IV, 1851-68). Prior 
to his accession to the throne, Mongkut had had extensive contact 
with Western missionaries and had studied European languages, 
science, and mathematics. Determined that his kingdom should 
not fall under Western colonial rule, as had neighboring Burma, 
Mongkut established diplomatic and trade relations with Britain, 
France, the United States, and other Western powers during his 
reign. As a result, Siam became a part of the international eco- 
nomic community. Under Mongkut's son and successor, 
Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 1868-1910), major reforms and Western- 
ization of the bureaucracy and society were adopted. At the same 
time, the central government tightened its control over outlying 
territories in the North and Northeast geographical regions that 
had previously been rather loosely governed through local princes 
and chiefs. By the early twentieth century, however, Siam had been 
forced to give up its suzerainty over Laos and western Cambodia 
to the French and its control over four Muslim states on the Malay 
Peninsula to the British. In return for these losses, Siam became 



xxn 



a protected buffer state between French Indochina and British 
Malaya and Burma. 

Reform and modernization supported by Mongkut and 
Chulalongkorn led to the rise of a Westernized military and politi- 
cal elite who increasingly agitated for a liberalizing of the political 
process. The Chakkri kings of the early twentieth century and their 
close advisers were somewhat less concerned with modernization 
of their rule and resisted efforts at establishing a constitutional 
monarchy. In 1932 a small group of Westernized military leaders 
and top bureaucrats organized a bloodless coup, forcing a constitu- 
tional monarchy on King Prajadhipok (Rama VII, 1925-35). Divi- 
siveness within the coup leadership, however, resulted in several 
decades of new constitutions and repeated coups, led by various 
military-bureaucratic factions. 

In 1939 the highly nationalistic regime of Prime Minister Luang 
Plaek Phibunsongkhram changed the name of the country to Muang 
Thai (Land of the Free), or Thailand. Negotiation and compromise 
by Phibun (as he was known) and his colleagues in government 
enabled the Thai to avoid the whole weight of a Japanese occupa- 
tion force during World War II. Although officially the Thai govern- 
ment had declared war on the Allies, its declaration was never 
delivered or accepted in the United States, which became a gather- 
ing point for Thai resistance efforts. Following the war, the Thai 
military continued its ascendancy in national life, and a growing 
communist insurgency in the 1950s prompted a buildup of Thai 
military strength. The United States government provided aid in 
the form of weapons and training for the Royal Thai Armed Forces. 
As United States involvement in Southeast Asia steadily increased 
during the Second Indochina War (1954-75), Thailand gave per- 
mission for the stationing of United States troops at a number of 
Thai naval and air bases, which were expanded and modernized. 
Following the end of the war and the detente between Beijing and 
Washington, Thailand established its own detente with China, 
which agreed not to support the Communist Party of Thailand. 
Thereafter, the government applied a combined military-economic 
approach to defeat the communist insurgents, who had dwindled 
to a handful by the mid-1980s. 

Student-led demonstrations in the 1970s had resulted in the liber- 
alization of government policies and a brief, but unsuccessful, 
experiment with democratic government. By the late 1970s, the 
Thai military-bureaucratic elites were again firmly in charge. 
Although the 1978 Constitution called for an elected House of 
Representatives in the nation's bicameral legislature, the National 
Assembly, the prime minister continued to be selected by a small 



xxm 



group of top-ranking military and bureaucratic leaders with the 
official approval of the king. There was no constitutional require- 
ment that the prime minister be an elected official, and not since 
1976 had the position been filled by an elected member of parlia- 
ment. The members of the Senate, largely drawn from the armed 
forces and police, were nominated by the prime minister and 
approved by the king (see The Central Government, ch. 4). 

As a constitutional monarch, King Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama 
IX, 1946- ) had endeavored to maintain a low political profile 
throughout his reign, and he appeared to be dedicated to the ex- 
pansion of the democratic process in Thailand. Bhumibol' s devo- 
tion to the welfare of his people was widely recognized. His 
particular interests included agricultural research and water resource 
management, and he had initiated some 4,600 development projects 
in these areas. A working monarch, the king (as well as his fami- 
ly) spent many months of the year visiting all corners of the realm, 
acquainting himself with the problems and needs of the people. 
Bhumibol' s rare assertions of political influence had been employed 
chiefly to maintain stability; in 1981 and again in 1985 he refused 
to support a military coup attempt, instead backing the legitimately 
elected government and the Constitution. Although the Thai 
government had been changed by an endless succession of coups 
and countercoups following the 1932 revolt, there had not been 
a successful coup since 1977. In 1987 Prime Minister Prem 
Tinsulanonda had served seven years in the post, despite the two 
attempted coups. The country's political stability in the 1980s had 
provided a favorable setting for Thailand's expanding economy. 

By 1987 the Thai economy was continuing to rebound from the 
worldwide recession that had resulted from the rising oil prices of 
the mid-1970s (see Economic and Financial Development, ch. 3). 
The economy grew by more than 6 percent in 1987 and was ex- 
pected to increase by at least that much in 1988. The manufactur- 
ing sector increased by more than 8 percent in 1987, reflecting a 
growing trend in the structure of the Thai economy toward light 
industry. Although food processing and other agro-industries con- 
tinued to be important, expansion was taking place in many in- 
dustries, such as textiles, where production was up nearly 50 percent 
in 1987 over the previous year. Exports of manufactures that grew 
rapidly in 1987 included plastic parts (up 187 percent), computer 
parts (up 111 percent), footwear (up 100 percent), and ball bear- 
ings (up 70 percent). In 1987 manufacturing accounted for about 
22 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP — see Glossary). 
Providing sufficient energy for its fast-growing industrial base, 
however, was a serious problem. Efforts were ongoing to find a 



xxiv 



cost-effective way to tap the country's limited petroleum and natural 
gas potential. Despite energy shortages, Thailand in the late 1980s 
was moving assuredly into the category of newly industrialized coun- 
try (NIC), to join the ranks of its Asian neighbors Singapore, 
Taiwan, the Republic of Korea (South Korea), and Hong Kong. 

Agriculture, for centuries the cornerstone of the Thai economy, 
continued to be of major importance. The chief exports were rice, 
rubber, cassava, maize, and sugar (see Agriculture, ch. 3). Agricul- 
ture's share of GDP, however, had declined from 22 percent in 
1982 to less than 17 percent in 1987. Part of the slowdown in the 
growth of agriculture was a result of the unavailability of new ara- 
ble land. Moreover, most of the new land that had been opened 
in the 1960s and 1970s had been turned to agriculture at the ex- 
pense of Thailand's forests, which had dwindled from more than 
50 percent of the country in 1961 to less than 30 percent by 1987. 
Although processing of agricultural commodities remained impor- 
tant, Thailand's growing manufacturing sector was increasingly 
becoming based on such products as integrated circuits, motor- 
cycles, textiles, jewelry, electrical appliances, and plastics. 

In the late 1980s, there was some disagreement among policy 
planners over which sector of manufacturing should be most 
strongly supported and emphasized. Some felt that support for 
agricultural processing would best benefit the poorer northeastern 
and southern regions. A project particularly designed to help the 
region east of Bangkok was the Eastern Seaboard Development Pro- 
gram.' Under this plan a new deep-water seaport was being built 
at Sattahip, both to relieve the pressure on Bangkok's overcrowded 
Khlong Toei port and to encourage development of the eastern 
region. Included among the projects were fertilizer and petrochem- 
ical plants. Also being developed was a new railroad line from 
Sattahip eastward to Rayong. Aside from the energy shortage, the 
inadequacy of the infrastructure — ports, railroads, and highways — 
was the country's most serious economic problem. Its greatest eco- 
nomic asset was its highly adaptable, increasingly skilled work force. 

Thai society, taken as a whole, was reasonably homogenous. The 
Tai ethnic stock, Tai language family, and Theravada Buddhism 
were common denominators for about 85 percent of the popula- 
tion. The presence of other ethnic, linguistic, and religious groups 
created some tensions in Thai society. Even among these groups, 
however, most members thought of themselves as Thai citizens 
owing allegiance to the Thai king and state. Among Thai citizens 
who were both ethnically and linguistically Tai, there were impor- 
tant differences. The dialect spoken by the Central Thai was con- 
sidered the standard for the country and was used in government 



xxv 



and schools. There were, however, nearly as many speakers of Thai- 
Lao, the dialect of much of the Northeast and parts of the North. 
The Southern Thai spoke yet another dialect. All of these dialects 
were mutually intelligible, but with some difficulty. Most Tai speak- 
ers were also Theravada Buddhists (see Religion, ch. 2). Among 
the non-Thai minorities, the Chinese were the largest, amounting 
to about 11 percent of the population. Most Chinese spoke Cen- 
tral Thai, at least as a second language. The Chinese varied in 
their degree of assimilation into Thai society, assimilation often 
depending on the length of time their families had been in the 
country. 

The next largest minority group was religious rather than eth- 
nic. Thai Muslims included ethnic Malay, Thai, Cham, and South 
Asians. The majority of Muslims, however, were Malay who lived 
in the four southern provinces on the Malay Peninsula, a tradi- 
tionally disadvantaged part of the country. Several Muslim 
separatist insurgent groups in the provinces near the Malaysian 
border continued in late 1987 to be a thorn in the side of the Thai 
military. Each of the other minority groups numbered less than 
1 percent of the population. Among these were various hill tribes, 
who were part of larger groups living in Laos, China, or Burma. 
Largely assimilated were the Mon and the Cham peoples, most 
of whose ancestors had been in the region for centuries. The Khmer 
were also fairly well integrated for the same reason, with the excep- 
tion of several hundred thousand Khmer refugees driven into 
Thailand since the 1970s by the continuing war in Cambodia. Other 
refugee groups included the Hmong from Laos. 

Since the 1960s, the Thai central government had taken a more 
enlightened view toward its minority peoples than in the past, when 
its policies vacillated between suppression, neglect, and forced 
assimilation. Partly as a result of King Bhumibpl's interest in the 
various minorities, increasing government assistance was being 
given to these groups in the form of improved health and social 
services and agricultural assistance. 

Although Thai society as a whole was enjoying the benefits of 
modernization — improved health care and sanitation, education, 
and modern tools and conveniences — it also faced the usual 
problems associated with too rapid modernization. Bangkok, par- 
ticularly, endured problems of overcrowding, pollution, traffic, 
housing shortages, unemployment, and the social ills of crime, drug 
abuse, and prostitution. 

As the national leadership looked ahead to the 1990s, its major 
concerns were the continued stabilization of the polity, encourage- 
ment of economic growth, and resolution of the security problems 



XXVI 



of the country. By the late 1980s, internal security was largely under 
control, with communist insurgents dwindling to a small number 
and Muslim separatist groups mainly a nuisance factor in the South 
(see Insurgency, ch. 5). External security was more problematic. 
Vietnam, which had invaded Cambodia in late 1978, continued 
to occupy the country, causing a steady stream of Khmer refugees 
into Thailand. Relations between Bangkok and Beijing grew in- 
creasingly cordial during the 1980s as a result of the Vietnamese 
occupation of Cambodia. This issue also brought a growing solidar- 
ity among the membership of the Association of Southeast Asian 
Nations (ASEAN). Although resolutions and endless rounds of talks 
were sponsored by the regional organization, by late 1987 the 
ASEAN nations seemed no closer to being able to induce Viet- 
nam to withdraw from Cambodia either through negotiation or 
through the pressure of regional and world opinion. 

* * * 

After the manuscript for this book was completed in the autumn 
of 1987, there were a number of important developments affect- 
ing Thailand both domestically and internationally. On April 29, 
1988, King Bhumibol decreed the dissolution of the House of 
Representatives at the request of Prime Minister Prem, who had 
been faced with increasing disunity in the political parties that made 
up the ruling coalition. New elections were scheduled for July 24, 
1988, amid calls from student and labor groups for a prime minister 
who was an elected member of parliament. On election day, the 
Thai voters gave 87 seats in the 357-seat House of Representa- 
tives to the Chart Thai (Thai Nation) Party, which formed a 
215-member coalition government with four other parties: Social 
Action (Kit Sangkhom) Party, Democrat (Prachathipat) Party, 
Rassadorn (People) Party, and United Democracy (Saha 
Prachathipatai) Party. All but the United Democracy Party had 
been partners in the previous government. In a surprise move, Prem 
refused an invitation by the ruling coalition to head the new govern- 
ment, saying he was responding to the people's call for an elected 
prime minister. The coalition then selected Chatichai Choonhaven, 
leader of the Chart Thai and deputy prime minister under Prem, 
to take the number one spot, thus giving Thailand its first elected 
prime minister in twelve years. Chatichai, who left the military 
in 1958 to serve as a diplomat and cabinet official, was considered 
to be probusiness and not likely to change Prem's economic poli- 
cies significantly. 



xxvn 



The Thai economy continued to boom in the first half of 1988. 
Exports were projected to total US$12 billion for the year, up 20 
percent for the second year in a row. Foreign investment in 
Thailand increased 30 percent in 1987 to US$210 million, with 
applications for investment up 140 percent to 1,057. Investor con- 
fidence was expected to continue under the new government. 
Tourism, the country's largest foreign exchange earner, was up 
23.6 percent in 1987, which had been billed as "Visit Thailand 
Year." Visitor arrivals during the first half of 1988 signaled an 
even bigger year, and more than 3.5 million tourists were expected. 

Particular attractions for visitors in 1987 and 1988 were two grand 
national celebrations accompanied by elaborate pomp and pag- 
eantry. On December 5, 1987, the country celebrated King 
Bhumibol's sixtieth birthday; and July 2, 1988, marked the forty- 
second year and twenty-third day of Bhumibol's reign. Passing the 
mark set by his grandfather, Chulalongkorn, he thus became the 
longest ruler of the 200-year-old Chakkri Dynasty. Both occasions 
were marked by an outpouring of the tremendous love and respect 
of the Thai people for their monarch. 

The first half of 1988 was also marked by regional developments 
important to Thailand's sense of national security. While on a visit 
to Moscow in May, Prime Minister Prem was informed by the 
Soviets of Vietnam's pledge to withdraw 50,000 troops from Cam- 
bodia in 1988. Hanoi already had withdrawn 20,000 troops in 
December 1987 and, according to its own projections, would be 
down to 50,000 troops by the end of 1988. These forces it promised 
to withdraw by its previously stated timetable of the end of 1990. 
Thailand at first reacted cautiously to the news. By mid-June, 
however, with its usual flexibility in foreign affairs, Bangkok was 
rolling out the red carpet for visiting Vietnamese foreign minister 
Nguyen Co Thach. The following month, the Vietnamese- 
controlled government in Cambodia freed the first group of an esti- 
mated 120 Thai prisoners it had promised to release in order to 
improve relations with Thailand. 

Bangkok's response to the new developments in Cambodia was 
also expressed in concert with the other ASEAN nations. In July 
the regional organization sponsored informal peace talks in Jakarta 
between the four warring Cambodian factions and other interested 
parties, including Vietnam, Laos, and the ASEAN countries. Little 
that was concrete came out of the Jakarta Informal Meeting other 
than an agreement to hold another meeting in 1989 at the senior 
official level. The Jakarta meeting did mark, however, the first time 
the various Cambodian factions had all sat down together to talk. 



xxvin 



In any event, more progress had been made in 1988 toward 
alleviating Thailand's most serious security concern than had been 
made in the previous decade. 



August 24, 1988 Barbara Leitch LePoer 



xxix 



Chapter 1. Historical Setting 




Stone Wheel of Law, Dvaravati Period (sixth to ninth centuries A.D.), found 
at Phra Pathom Chedi, Nakhon Pathom Province 



LITTLE IS KNOWN of the earliest inhabitants of what is now 
Thailand, but 5,000-year-old archaeological sites in the northeastern 
part of the country are believed to contain the oldest evidence of 
rice cultivation and bronze casting in Asia and perhaps in the world. 
In early historical times, a succession of tribal groups controlled 
what is now Thailand. The Mon and Khmer peoples established 
powerful kingdoms that included large areas of the country. They 
absorbed from contact with South Asian peoples religious, social, 
political, and cultural ideas and institutions that later influenced 
the development of Thailand's culture and national identity. 

The Tai, a people who originally lived in southwestern China, 
migrated into mainland Southeast Asia over a period of many cen- 
turies. The first mention of their existence in the region is a twelfth- 
century A.D. inscription at the Khmer temple complex of Angkor 
Wat in Cambodia, which refers to syam, or "dark brown" people 
(the origin of the term Siam) as vassals of the Khmer monarch. In 
1238 a Tai chieftain declared his independence from the Khmer 
and established a kingdom at Sukhothai in the broad valley of the 
Mae Nam (river) Chao Phraya, at the center of modern Thailand. 
Sukhothai was succeeded in the fourteenth century by the king- 
dom of Ayutthaya. The Burmese invaded Ayutthaya and in 
1767 destroyed the capital, but two national heroes, Taksin and 
Chakkri, soon expelled the invaders and reunified the country under 
the Chakkri Dynasty. 

Over the centuries Thai national identity evolved around a com- 
mon language and religion and the institution of the monarchy. 
Although the inhabitants of Thailand are a mixture of Tai, Mon, 
Khmer, and other ethnic groups, most speak a language of the Tai 
family. A Tai language alphabet, based on Indian and Khmer 
scripts, developed early in the fourteenth century. Later in the cen- 
tury a famous monarch, Ramathibodi, made Theravada Buddhism 
the official religion of his kingdom, and Buddhism continued into 
the twentieth century as a dominant factor in the nation's social, 
cultural, and political life. Finally, the monarchy, buttressed ideo- 
logically by Hindu and Buddhist mythology, was a focus for popular 
loyalties for more than seven centuries. In the late twentieth cen- 
tury the monarchy remained central to national unity. 

During the nineteenth century, European expansionism, rather 
than Thailand's traditional enemies, posed the greatest threat to 
the kingdom's survival. Thai success in preserving the country's 



3 



Thailand: A Country Study 

independence (it was the only Southeast Asian country to do so) 
was in part a result of the desire of Britain and France for a stable 
buffer state separating their dominions in Burma, Malaya, and 
Indochina. More important, however, was the willingness of 
Thailand's monarchs, Mongkut (Rama IV, 1851-68) and 
Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 1868-1910), to negotiate openly with 
the European powers and to adopt European- style reforms that 
modernized the country and won it sovereign status among the 
world's nations. Thailand (then known as Siam) paid a high price 
for its independence, however: loss of suzerainty over Cambodia 
and Laos to France and cession of the northern states of the Malay 
Peninsula to Britain. By 1910 the area under Thai control was a 
fraction of what it had been a century earlier. 

In the early decades of the twentieth century, Thailand's polit- 
ical system, armed forces, schools, and economy underwent 
drastic changes. Many Thai studied overseas, and a small, Western- 
educated elite with less traditional ideas emerged. In 1932 a blood- 
less coup d'etat by military officers and civil servants ended the 
absolute monarchy and inaugurated Thailand's constitutional era. 
Progress toward a stable, democratic political system since that time, 
however, has been erratic. Politics has been dominated by rival 
military-bureaucratic cliques headed by powerful generals. These 
cliques have initiated repeated coups d'etat and have imposed 
prolonged periods of martial law. Parliamentary institutions, as 
defined by Thailand's fourteen constitutions between 1932 and 
1987, and competition among civilian politicians have generally 
been facades for military governments. 

Early History 

Over the course of millennia, migrations from southern China 
peopled Southeast Asia, including the area of contemporary 
Thailand (see fig. 2). Archaeological evidence indicates a thriving 
Paleolithic culture in the region and continuous human habitation 
for at least 20,000 years. 

The pace of economic and social development was uneven and 
conditioned by climate and geography. The dense forests of the 
Chao Phraya Valley in the central part of Thailand and the Malay 
Peninsula in the south produced such an abundance of food that 
for a long time there was no need to move beyond a hunting-and- 
gathering economy. In contrast, rice cultivation appeared early in 
the highlands of the far north and hastened the development of 
a more communal social and political organization. 

Excavations at Ban Chiang, a small village on the Khorat Plateau 
in northeastern Thailand, have revealed evidence of prehistoric 



4 



Historical Setting 



inhabitants who may have forged bronze implements as early as 
3000 B.C. and cultivated rice around the fourth millennium B.C. 
If so, the Khorat Plateau would be the oldest rice-producing area 
in Asia because the inhabitants of China at that time still consumed 
millet. Archaeologists have assembled evidence that the bronze im- 
plements found at the Thai sites were forged in the area and not 
transported from elsewhere. They supported this claim by point- 
ing out that both copper and tin deposits (components of bronze) 
are found in close proximity to the Ban Chiang sites. If these claims 
are correct, Thai bronze forgers would have predated the "Bronze 
Age, ' ' which archaeologists had traditionally believed began in the 
Middle East around 2800 B.C. and in China about a thousand 
years later. 

Before the end of the first millennium B.C., tribal territories had 
begun to coalesce into protohistorical kingdoms whose names sur- 
vive in Chinese dynastic annals of the period. Funan, a state of 
substantial proportions, emerged in the second century B.C. as 
the earliest and most significant power in Southeast Asia (see fig. 3). 
Its Hindu ruling class controlled all of present-day Cambodia and 
extended its power to the center of modern Thailand. The Funan 
economy was based on maritime trade and a well-developed agricul- 
tural system; Funan maintained close commercial contact with India 
and served as a base for the Brahman merchant-missionaries who 
brought Hindu culture to Southeast Asia. 

On the narrow isthmus to the southwest of Funan, Malay city- 
states controlled the portage routes that were traversed by traders 
and travelers journeying between India and Indochina. By the tenth 
century A.D. the strongest of them, Tambralinga (present-day 
Nakhon Si Thammarat), had gained control of all routes across 
the isthmus. Along with other city-states on the Malay Peninsula 
and Sumatra, it had become part of the Srivijaya Empire, a mari- 
time confederation that between the seventh and thirteenth centu- 
ries dominated trade on the South China Sea and exacted tolls from 
all traffic through the Strait of Malacca. Tambralinga adopted 
Buddhism, but farther south many of the Malay city-states con- 
verted to Islam, and by the fifteenth century an enduring religious 
boundary had been established on the isthmus between Buddhist 
mainland Southeast Asia and Muslim Malaya. 

Although the Thai conquered the states of the isthmus in the 
thirteenth century and continued to control them in the modern 
period, the Malay of the peninsula were never culturally absorbed 
into the mainstream of Thai society. The differences in religion, 
language, and ethnic origin caused strains in social and political 
relations between the central government and the southern 



5 




6 



Historical Setting 



provinces into the late twentieth century (see Ethnicity, Regional- 
ism, and Language, ch. 2). 

The Mon and the Khmer 

The closely related Mon and Khmer peoples entered Southeast 
Asia along migration routes from southern China in the ninth cen- 
tury B.C. The Khmer settled in the Mekong River Valley, while 
the Mon occupied the central plain and northern highlands of 
modern Thailand and large parts of Burma. Taking advantage of 
Funan's decline in the sixth century A.D., the Mon began to es- 
tablish independent kingdoms, among them Dvaravati in the north- 
ern part of the area formerly controlled by Funan and farther north 
at Haripunjaya. Meanwhile the Khmer laid the foundation for 
their great empire of the ninth to fifteenth centuries A.D. This em- 
pire would be centered at Angkor (near modern Siem Reap) in 
Cambodia. 

The Mon were receptive to the art and literature of India, and 
for centuries they were the agents for diffusing Hindu cultural values 
in the region. The frequent occurrence of Sanskrit place-names in 
modern Thailand is one result of the long and pervasive Indian 
influence. 

In the eighth century, missionaries from Ceylon (present-day 
Sri Lanka) introduced the Mon to Theravada Buddhism. The Mon 
embraced Buddhism enthusiastically and conveyed it to the Khmer 
and the Malay of Tambralinga (see Religion, ch. 2). The two Indian 
religious systems — Hindu and Buddhist — existed side by side with- 
out conflict. Hinduism continued to provide the cultural setting 
in which Buddhist religious values and ethical standards were articu- 
lated. Although Buddhism was the official religion of the Mon 
and the Khmer, in popular practice it incorporated many local 
cults. 

In spite of cultural dominance in the region, the Mon were repeat- 
edly subdued by their Burmese and Khmer neighbors. In the tenth 
century Dvaravati and the whole of the Chao Phraya Valley came 
under the control of Angkor. The Khmer maintained the Hindu- 
Buddhist culture received from the Mon but placed added emphasis 
on the Hindu concept of sacred kingship. The history of Angkor 
can be read in the magnificent structures built to glorify its monar- 
chy. Ultimately, however, obsession with palaces and temples led 
the Khmer rulers to divert too much manpower to their construc- 
tion and to neglect the elaborate agricultural system — part of 
Angkor's heritage from Funan — that was the empire's most im- 
portant economic asset. 



7 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Historical Setting 



The Tai People: Origins and Migrations 

The forebears of the modern Thai were Tai-speaking people liv- 
ing south of the Chang Jiang (Yangtze River) on the mountainous 
plateau of what is now the Chinese province of Yunnan (see The 
Thai and Other Tai-Speaking Peoples, ch. 2). Early Chinese records 
(the first recorded Chinese reference to the Tai is dated sixth cen- 
tury B.C.) document the Tai cultivating wetland rice in valley and 
lowland areas. During the first millennium A.D., before the emer- 
gence of formal states governed by Tai-speaking elites, these peo- 
ple lived in scattered villages drawn together into muang, or 
principalities. Each muang was governed by a chao, or lord, who 
ruled by virtue of personal qualities and a network of patron-client 
relationships. Often the constituent villages of a muang would band 
together to defend their lands from more powerful neighboring peo- 
ples, such as the Chinese and Vietnamese. 

The state of Nanchao played a key role in Tai development. In 
the mid-seventh century A.D., the Chinese Tang Dynasty, threat- 
ened by powerful western neighbors like Tibet, sought to secure 
its southwestern borders by fostering the growth of a friendly state 
formed by the people they called man (southern barbarians) in the 
Yunnan region. This state was known as Nanchao. Originally an 
ally, Nanchao became a powerful foe of the Chinese in subsequent 
centuries and extended its domain into what is now Burma and 
northern Vietnam. In 1253 the armies of Kublai Khan conquered 
Nanchao and incorporated it into the Yuan (Mongol) Chinese 
empire. 

Nanchao 's significance for the Tai people was twofold. First, it 
blocked Chinese influence from the north for many centuries. Had 
Nanchao not existed, the Tai, like most of the originally non- 
Chinese peoples south of the Chang Jiang, might have been com- 
pletely assimilated into the Chinese cultural sphere. Second, 
Nanchao stimulated Tai migration and expansion. Over several 
centuries, bands of Tai from Yunnan moved steadily into Southeast 
Asia, and by the thirteenth century they had reached as far west 
as Assam (in present-day India). Once settled, they became iden- 
tified in Burma as the Shan and in the upper Mekong region as 
the Lao. In Tonkin and Annam, the northern and central portions 
of present-day Vietnam, the Tai formed distinct tribal groupings: 
Tai Dam (Black Tai), Tai Deng (Red Tai), Tai Khao (White Tai), 
and Nung. However, most of the Tai settled on the northern and 
western fringes of the Khmer Empire. 

The Thai have traditionally regarded the founding of the king- 
dom of Sukhothai as marking their emergence as a distinct nation. 



9 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Tradition sets 1238 as the date when Tai chieftains overthrew the 
Khmer at Sukhothai, capital of Angkor's outlying northwestern 
province, and established a Tai kingdom. A flood of migration 
resulting from Kublai Khan's conquest of Nanchao furthered the 
consolidation of independent Tai states. Tai warriors, fleeing the 
Mongol invaders, reinforced Sukhothai against the Khmer, ensur- 
ing its supremacy in the central plain. In the north, other Tai war 
parties conquered the old Mon state of Haripunjaya and in 1296 
founded the kingdom of Lan Na with its capital at Chiang Mai 
(see fig. 4). 

Sukhothai 

Situated on the banks of the Mae Nam Yom some 375 kilometers 
north of present-day Bangkok, Sukhothai was the cradle of Thai 
civilization, the place where its institutions and culture first devel- 
oped. Indeed, it was there in the late thirteenth century that the 
people of the central plain, lately freed from Khmer rule, took the 
name Thai, meaning "free," to set themselves apart from other 
Tai speakers still under foreign rule. 

The first ruler of Sukhothai for whom historical records survive 
was Ramkhamhaeng (Rama the Great, 1277-1317). He was a 
famous warrior who claimed to be "sovereign lord of all the Tai" 
and financed his court with war booty and tribute from vassal states 
in Burma, Laos, and the Malay Peninsula. During his reign, the 
Thai established diplomatic relations with China and acknowledged 
the Chinese emperor as nominal overlord of the Thai kingdom. 
Ramkhamhaeng brought Chinese artisans to Sukhothai to develop 
the ceramics industry that was a mainstay of the Thai economy 
for 500 years. He also devised the Thai alphabet by adapting a 
Khmer script derived from the Indian Devanagari script. 

Sukhothai declined rapidly after Ramkhamhaeng' s death, as 
vassal states broke away from the suzerainty of his weak succes- 
sors. Despite the reputation of its later kings for wisdom and piety, 
the politically weakened Sukhothai was forced to submit in 1378 
to the Thai kingdom of Ayutthaya. 

The Ayutthaya Era, 1350-1767 

The kingdom of Ayutthaya was founded by U Thong, an ad- 
venturer allegedly descended from a rich Chinese merchant family 
who married royalty. In 1350, to escape the threat of an epidemic, 
he moved his court south into the rich floodplain of the Chao 
Phraya. On an island in the river he founded a new capital, which 
he called Ayutthaya, after Ayodhya in northern India, the city of 



10 



Historical Setting 



the hero Rama in the Hindu epic Ramayana. U Thong assumed 
the royal name of Ramathibodi (1350-60). 

Ramathibodi tried to unify his kingdom. In 1360 he declared 
Theravada Buddhism the official religion of Ayutthaya and brought 
members of asangha, a Buddhist monastic community, from Ceylon 
to establish new religious orders and spread the faith among his 
subjects. He also compiled a legal code, based on the Indian 
Dharmashastra (a Hindu legal text) and Thai custom, which became 
the basis of royal legislation. Composed in Pali — an Indo-Aryan 
language closely related to Sanskrit and the language of the 
Theravada Buddhist scriptures — it had the force of divine injunc- 
tion. Supplemented by royal decrees, Ramathibodi' s legal code 
remained generally in force until the late nineteenth century. 

By the end of the fourteenth century, Ayutthaya was regarded 
as the strongest power in Southeast Asia, but it lacked the man- 
power to dominate the region. In the last year of his reign, 
Ramathibodi had seized Angkor during what was to be the first 
of many successful Thai assaults on the Khmer capital. Thai policy 
was aimed at securing Ayutthaya' s eastern frontier by preempt- 
ing Vietnamese designs on Khmer territory. The weakened Khmer 
periodically submitted to Thai suzerainty, but efforts by Ayutthaya 
to maintain control over Angkor were repeatedly frustrated. Thai 
troops were frequently diverted to suppress rebellions in Sukhothai 
or to campaign against Chiang Mai, where Ayutthaya' s expan- 
sion was tenaciously resisted. Eventually Ayutthaya subdued the 
territory that had belonged to Sukhothai, and the year after 
Ramathibodi died, his kingdom was recognized by the emperor 
of China's newly established Ming Dynasty as Sukhothai' s right- 
ful successor. 

The Thai kingdom was not a single, unified state but rather a 
patchwork of self-governing principalities and tributary provinces 
owing allegiance to the king of Ayutthaya. These states were ruled 
by members of the royal family of Ayutthaya who had their own 
armies and warred among themselves. The king had to be vigilant 
to prevent royal princes from combining against him or allying with 
Ayutthaya' s enemies. Whenever the succession was in dispute, 
princely governors gathered their forces and moved on the capital 
to press their claims. 

During much of the fifteenth century Ayutthaya' s energies were 
directed toward the Malay Peninsula, where the great trading port 
of Malacca contested Thai claims to sovereignty. Malacca and other 
Malay states south of Tambralinga had become Muslim early in 
the century, and thereafter Islam served as a symbol of Malay 
solidarity against the Thai. Although the Thai failed to make a 



11 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 4. Origin and Range of the Tai Peoples 
Southeast Asia, Thirteenth Century 



12 



Historical Setting 



vassal state of Malacca, Ayutthaya continued to control the lucra- 
tive trade on the isthmus, which attracted Chinese traders of 
specialty goods for the luxury markets of China. 

Thai Kingship 

Thai rulers were absolute monarchs whose office was partly 
religious in nature. They derived their authority from the ideal 
qualities they were believed to possess. The king was the moral 
model, who personified the virtue of his people, and his country 
lived at peace and prospered because of his meritorious actions. 
At Sukhothai, where Ramkhamhaeng was said to hear the peti- 
tion of any subject who rang the bell at the palace gate to summon 
him, the king was revered as a father by his people. But the pater- 
nal aspects of kingship disappeared at Ayutthaya, where, under 
Khmer influence, the monarchy withdrew behind a wall of taboos 
and rituals. The king was considered chakkraphat, the Sanskrit-Pali 
term for the "wheel-rolling" universal prince who through his 
adherence to the law made all the world revolve around him. As 
the Hindu god Shiva was "lord of the universe," the Thai king 
also became by analogy "lord of the land," distinguished in his 
appearance and bearing from his subjects. According to the 
elaborate court etiquette, even a special language, Phasa Ratchasap, 
was used to communicate with or about royalty. 

As devaraja (Sanskrit for "divine king"), the king ultimately came 
to be recognized as the earthly incarnation of Shiva and became 
the object of a politico-religious cult officiated over by a corps of 
royal Brahmans who were part of the Buddhist court retinue. In 
the Buddhist context, the devaraja was a bodhisattva (an enlight- 
ened being who, out of compassion, foregoes nirvana in order to 
aid others). The belief in divine kingship prevailed into the eight- 
eenth century, although by that time its religious implications had 
limited impact. 

One of the numerous institutional innovations of King Trailok 
(1448-88) was to create the position of uparaja, or heir apparent, 
usually held by the king's senior son or full brother, in an attempt 
to regularize the succession to the throne — a particularly difficult 
feat for a polygamous dynasty. In practice, there was inherent con- 
flict between king and uparaja and frequent disputed successions. 

Social and Political Development 

The king stood at the apex of a highly stratified social and polit- 
ical hierarchy that extended throughout the society. In Ayutthayan 
society the basic unit of social organization was the village com- 
munity composed of extended family households. Generally the 



13 



Thailand: A Country Study 

elected headmen provided leadership for communal projects. Title 
to land resided with the headman, who held it in the name of the 
community, although peasant proprietors enjoyed the use of land 
as long as they cultivated it. 

With ample reserves of land available for cultivation, the via- 
bility of the state depended on the acquisition and control of ade- 
quate manpower for farm labor and defense. The dramatic rise 
of Ayutthaya had entailed constant warfare and, as none of the 
parties in the region possessed a technological advantage, the out- 
come of battles was usually determined by the size of the armies. 
After each victorious campaign, Ayutthaya carried away a num- 
ber of conquered people to its own territory, where they were 
assimilated and added to the labor force. 

Every freeman had to be registered as a servant, or phrai (see 
Glossary), with the local lord, or nai (see Glossary), for military 
service and corvee labor on public works and on the land of the 
official to whom he was assigned. The phrai could also meet his 
labor obligation by paying a tax. If he found the forced labor under 
his nai repugnant, he could sell himself into slavery to a more 
attractive nai, who then paid a fee to the government in compen- 
sation for the loss of corvee labor. As much as one-third of the man- 
power supply into the nineteenth century was composed of phrai. 

Wealth, status, and political influence were interrelated. The king 
allotted rice fields to governors, military commanders, and court 
officials in payment for their services to the crown, according to 
the sakdi na (see Glossary) system. The size of each official's allot- 
ment was determined by the number of persons he could command 
to work it. The amount of manpower a particular nai could com- 
mand determined his status relative to others in the hierarchy and 
his wealth. At the apex of the hierarchy, the king, who was the 
realm's largest landholder, also commanded the services of the larg- 
est number of phrai, called phrai luang (royal servants), who paid 
taxes, served in the royal army, and worked on the crown lands. 
King Trailok established definite allotments of land and phrai for 
the royal officials at each rung in the hierarchy, thus determining 
the country's social structure until the introduction of salaries for 
government officials in the nineteenth century. 

The Chinese alone stood outside this social structure. They were 
not obliged to register for corvee duty, so they were free to move 
about the kingdom at will and engage in commerce. By the six- 
teenth century, the Chinese controlled Ayutthaya' s internal trade 
and had found important places in the civil and military service. 
Most of these men took Thai wives because few women left China 
to accompany the men. 



14 



Historical Setting 



The sixteenth century witnessed the rise of Burma, which, under 
an aggressive dynasty, had overrun Chiang Mai and Laos and made 
war on the Thai. In 1569 Burmese forces, joined by Thai rebels, 
captured the city of Ayutthaya and carried off the royal family to 
Burma. Dhammaraja (1569-90), a Thai governor who had aided 
the Burmese, was installed as vassal king at Ayutthaya. Thai 
independence was restored by his son, King Naresuan (1590-1605), 
who turned on the Burmese and by 1600 had driven them from 
the country (see fig. 5). 

Determined to prevent another treason like his father's, Naresuan 
set about unifying the country's administration directly under the 
royal court at Ayutthaya. He ended the practice of nominating royal 
princes to govern Ayutthaya' s provinces, assigning instead court 
officials who were expected to execute policies handed down by 
the king. Thereafter royal princes were confined to the capital. Their 
power struggles continued, but at court under the king's watchful 
eye. 

In order to ensure his control over the new class of governors, 
Naresuan decreed that all freemen subject to phrai service had be- 
come phrai luang, bound directly to the king, who distributed the 
use of their services to his officials. This measure gave the king 
a theoretical monopoly on all manpower, and the idea developed 
that since the king owned the services of all the people, he also pos- 
sessed all the land. Ministerial offices and governorships — and the 
sakdi na that went with them — were usually inherited positions domi- 
nated by a few families often connected to the king by marriage. 
Indeed, marriage was frequently used by Thai kings to cement 
alliances between themselves and powerful families, a custom 
prevailing through the nineteenth century. As a result of this policy, 
the king's wives usually numbered in the dozens. 

Even with Naresuan' s reforms, the effectiveness of the royal 
government over the next 150 years should not be overestimated. 
Royal power outside the crown lands — although in theory abso- 
lute — was in practice limited by the looseness of the civil adminis- 
tration. The influence of central government ministers was not 
extensive beyond the capital until the late nineteenth century. 

Economic Development 

The Thai never lacked a rich food supply. Peasants planted rice 
for their own consumption and to pay taxes. Whatever remained 
was used to support religious institutions. From the thirteenth to 
the fifteenth century, however, a remarkable transformation took 
place in Thai rice cultivation. In the highlands, where rainfall had 
to be supplemented by a system of irrigation that controlled the 



15 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 5. Centers of Power, Thirteenth to Eighteenth Centuries 



16 



Historical Setting 



water level in flooded paddies, the Thai sowed the glutinous rice 
that is still the staple in the geographical regions of the North and 
Northeast. But in the floodplain of the Chao Phraya, farmers turned 
to a different variety of rice — the so-called floating rice, a slender, 
nonglutinous grain introduced from Bengal — that would grow fast 
enough to keep pace with the rise of the water level in the lowland 
fields (see Crops, ch. 3). 

The new strain grew easily and abundantly, producing a sur- 
plus that could be sold cheaply abroad. Ayutthaya, situated at the 
southern extremity of the floodplain, thus became the hub of eco- 
nomic activity. Under royal patronage, corvee labor dug canals 
on which rice was brought from the fields to the king's ships for 
export to China. In the process, the Chao Phraya Delta — mud flats 
between the sea and firm land hitherto considered unsuitable for 
habitation — was reclaimed and placed under cultivation. 

Contacts with the West 

In 1511 Ayutthaya received a diplomatic mission from the Por- 
tuguese, who earlier that year had conquered Malacca. These were 
probably the first Europeans to visit the country. Five years after 
that initial contact, Ayutthaya and Portugal concluded a treaty 
granting the Portuguese permission to trade in the kingdom. A 
similar treaty in 1592 gave the Dutch a privileged position in the 
rice trade. 

Foreigners were cordially welcomed at the court of Narai 
(1657-88), a ruler with a cosmopolitan outlook who was nonethe- 
less wary of outside influence. Important commercial ties were 
forged with Japan. Dutch and English trading companies were 
allowed to establish factories, and Thai diplomatic missions were 
sent to Paris and The Hague. By maintaining all these ties, the 
Thai court skillfully played off the Dutch against the English and 
the French against the Dutch in order to avoid the excessive 
influence of a single power. 

In 1664, however, the Dutch used force to exact a treaty grant- 
ing them extraterritorial rights as well as freer access to trade. At 
the urging of his foreign minister, the Greek adventurer Constantine 
Phaulkon, Narai turned to France for assistance. French engineers 
constructed fortifications for the Thai and built a new palace at 
Lop Buri for Narai. In addition, French missionaries engaged in 
education and medicine and brought the first printing press into 
the country. Louis XIV s personal interest was aroused by reports 
from missionaries suggesting that Narai might be converted to 
Christianity. 



17 



Thailand: A Country Study 

The French presence encouraged by Phaulkon, however, stirred 
the resentment and suspicions of the Thai nobles and Buddhist 
clergy. When word spread that Narai was dying, a general, Phra 
Phetracha, killed the designated heir, a Christian, and had Phaulkon 
put to death along with a number of missionaries. The arrival of 
English warships provoked a massacre of more Europeans. 
Phetracha (reigned 1688-93) seized the throne, expelled the remain- 
ing foreigners, and ushered in a 150-year period during which the 
Thai consciously isolated themselves from contacts with the West. 

Ayutthaya: The Final Phase 

After a bloody period of dynastic struggle, Ayutthaya entered 
into what has been called its golden age, a relatively peaceful epi- 
sode in the second quarter of the eighteenth century when art, liter- 
ature, and learning flourished. Ayutthaya continued to compete 
with Vietnam for control of Cambodia, but a greater threat came 
from Burma, where a new dynasty had subdued the Shan states. 

In 1765 Thai territory was invaded by three Burmese armies 
that converged on Ayutthaya. After a lengthy siege, the city capit- 
ulated and was burned in 1767. Ayutthaya' s art treasures, the 
libraries containing its literature, and the archives housing its his- 
toric records were almost totally destroyed, and the city was left 
in ruins. 

The country was reduced to chaos. Provinces were proclaimed 
independent states under military leaders, rogue monks, and cadet 
members of the royal family. The Thai were saved from Burmese 
subjugation, however, by an opportune Chinese invasion of Burma 
and by the leadership of a Thai military commander, Phraya 
Taksin. 

The Bangkok Period, 1767-1932 

As they had in the sixteenth century, the Thai made a rapid 
recovery under a brilliant military leader. Taksin (1767-82) had 
slipped away from besieged Ayutthaya and, starting with a hand- 
ful of followers who quickly grew into an army, organized a 
resistance to the Burmese invaders, driving them out after a long 
and arduous war. Assuming the royal title, he abandoned the ruined 
Ayutthaya and founded a new capital farther south in the delta 
at Thon Buri, a fortress town across the river from modern 
Bangkok. By 1776 Taksin had reunited the Thai kingdom, which 
had fragmented into small states after the fall of the old capital, 
and had annexed Chiang Mai. Taksin, who eventually developed 
delusions of his own divinity, was deposed and executed by 
his ministers, invoking the interests of the state. His manifold 



18 



Historical Setting 



accomplishments, however, won Taksin a secure place among 
Thailand's national heroes. 

The Chakkri Dynasty 

With the death of Taksin, the Thai throne fell to Chakkri, a 
general who had played a leading role with Taksin in the struggle 
against the Burmese. As King Yot Fa (Rama I, 1782-1809), he 
founded the present Thai ruling house and moved the court to Bang- 
kok, the modern capital (see table 2, Appendix). During an ener- 
getic reign, he revived the country's economy and restored what 
remained of the great artistic heritage lost in the destruction of Ayut- 
thaya. The king is credited with composing a new edition of the 
Ramakian (the Thai version of the Ramayand) to replace manuscripts 
of the Thai national epic that were lost in the conflagration. 

In the following years Thai influence grew until challenged by 
Western powers. In 1795 the Thai seized the provinces of Battam- 
bang and Siem Reap in Cambodia, where throughout the first half 
of the next century Chakkri kings would resist Vietnamese incur- 
sions. The conflict between the Thai and the Vietnamese was 
resolved finally by a compromise providing for the establishment 
of a joint protectorate over Cambodia. The Thai also pressed their 
claim to suzerainty in the Malay state of Kedah in the face of grow- 
ing British interest in the peninsula. As a result of the Anglo- 
Burmese War (1824-26), Britain annexed territory in the region 
that had been contested by the Thai and the Burmese for centu- 
ries. This move led to the signing of the Burney Treaty in 1826, 
an Anglo-Thai agreement that allowed British merchants modest 
trade concessions in the kingdom. In 1833 the Thai reached a similar 
understanding with the United States. 

Chakkri expansionism had been halted in all directions by the 
end of the reign of Nang Klao (Rama III, 1824-51) as tributary 
provinces began to slip away from Bangkok's control and Western 
influence grew. In 1850 Nang Klao spurned British and Ameri- 
can requests for more generous trading privileges similar to those 
that Western powers had exacted by force from China. Succeed- 
ing Thai monarchs, however, were less successful in controlling 
Western economic influence in their country. 

The first three Chakkri kings, by succeeding each other without 
bloodshed, had brought the kingdom a degree of political stability 
that had been lacking in the Ayutthaya period. There was, however, 
no rule providing for automatic succession to the throne. If there 
was no uparaja at the time of the king's death — and this was fre- 
quently the case — the choice of a new monarch drawn from the 
royal family was left to the Senabodi, the council of senior officials, 



19 



Thailand: A Country Study 

princes, and Buddhist prelates that assembled at the death of a king. 
It was such a council that chose Nang Klao's successor. 

Mongkut's Opening to the West 

Nang Klao died in 1851 and was succeeded by his forty-seven- 
year-old half brother, Mongkut (Rama IV, 1851-68). Mongkut's 
father, Loet La (Rama II, 1809-24), had placed him in a Bud- 
dhist monastery in 1824 to prevent a bloody succession struggle 
between factions loyal to Mongkut and those supporting Nang Klao 
(although Nang Klao was older than Mongkut, his mother was a 
concubine, whereas Mongkut's mother was a royal queen). As a 
Buddhist monk, Mongkut won distinction as an authority on the 
Pali Buddhist scriptures and became head of a reformed order of 
the Siamese sangha. Thai Buddhism had become heavily overlain 
with superstitions through the centuries, and Mongkut attempted 
to purge the religion of these accretions and restore to it the spirit 
of Buddha's original teachings (see Religion, ch. 2). 

Mongkut's twenty-seven years as a Buddhist monk not only made 
him a religious figure of some consequence but also exposed him 
to a wide array of foreign influences. Blessed with an inquiring 
mind and. great curiosity about the outside world, he cultivated 
contacts with French Roman Catholic and United States Protes- 
tant missionaries. He studied Western languages (Latin and En- 
glish), science, and mathematics. His lengthy conversations with 
the missionaries gave him a broad perspective that greatly influenced 
his policies when he became king in 1851 . He was more knowledge- 
able of, and at ease with, Western ways than any previous Thai 
monarch. 

Mongkut was convinced that his realm must have full relations 
with the Western countries in order to survive as an independent 
nation and avoid the humiliations China and Burma had suffered 
in wars with Britain. Against the advice of his court, he abolished 
the old royal trade monopoly in commodities and in 1855 signed 
the Treaty of Friendship and Commerce with Britain. (This treaty, 
commonly known as the Bo wring Treaty, was signed on Britain's 
behalf by Sir John Bowring, governor of Hong Kong.) Under the 
terms of the treaty, British merchants were permitted to buy and 
sell in Siam without intermediaries, a consulate was established, 
and British subjects were granted extraterritorial rights. Similar 
treaties were negotiated the next year with the United States and 
France, and over the next fifteen years with a number of other Euro- 
pean countries. These agreements not only provided for free trade 
but also limited the Siamese government's authority to tax foreign 
enterprises. The elimination of these barriers led to an enormous 



20 



Historical Setting 



increase in commerce with the West. This expansion of trade in 
turn revolutionized the Thai economy and connected it to the world 
monetary system. 

The demand for extraterritorial privileges also convinced the king 
that unless Siam's legal and administrative systems were reformed, 
the country would never be treated as an equal by the Western 
powers. Although little in the way of substantive modernization 
was accomplished during his reign, Mongkut eliminated some of 
the ancient mystique of the monarch's divinity by allowing com- 
moners to gaze on his face, published a royal gazette of the coun- 
try's laws, and hired a number of Western experts as consultants, 
teachers, and technicians. Long-standing institutions such as slavery 
remained basically untouched, however, and the political system 
continued to be dominated by the great families. Conservatives 
at court remained strong, and the king's death from malaria in 
1868 postponed pending reform projects. 

Chulalongkorn's Reforms 

When Mongkut died, his eldest son, Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 
1868-1910), a minor at the time, succeeded him. Under his father's 
direction, Chulalongkorn had received a thorough education by 
European tutors. During the regency that preceded his coming of 
age, the young king visited Java and India in order to witness Euro- 
pean colonial administration. Thus he was the first Chakkri 
monarch to leave the country. At his coronation in 1873, he an- 
nounced the abolition of the ancient practice of prostrating before 
the monarch, which he regarded as unsuitable for a modern na- 
tion. A number of reform decrees followed, designed to modern- 
ize the judiciary, state finances, and political structure. The reforms, 
however, provoked a revolt by conservatives under Prince 
Wichaichan in December 1874. Although the revolt was suppressed, 
it obliged Chulalongkorn to abandon "radicalism" and proceed 
more carefully with reforms. It was more than a decade before the 
king and his associates were in a position to enact more significant 
changes. 

One of the most far-reaching of the later reforms was the aboli- 
tion of slavery and the phrai corvee. Slavery was eliminated gradu- 
ally, allowing considerable time for social and economic adaptation, 
and only disappeared in 1905. As a result of the introduction of 
a head tax paid in currency and a regular army manned by con- 
scription, the corvee lost most of its function, and wage labor, often 
provided by Chinese immigrants, proved more efficient for public 
works projects. Likewise, the introduction of salaries for public 



21 



Thailand: A Country Study 

officials eliminated the need for the sakdi na. These reforms wrought 
profound changes in Thai society. 

In 1887 the king asked one of his princes, Devawongse, to initi- 
ate a study of European forms of government and how European 
institutions might be fruitfully adopted. The following year, the 
prince returned with a proposal for a cabinet government consist- 
ing of twelve functionally differentiated ministries. The king ap- 
proved the plan, though several years passed before it could be fully 
implemented. In 1893 Prince Damrong Rajanubhab, acting as 
minister of interior, began an overhaul of Siam's antiquated provin- 
cial administration. The old semifeudal system in the outer 
provinces was gradually replaced by a centralized state adminis- 
tration. Under Damrong, the Ministry of Interior became im- 
mensely powerful and played a central role in national unification. 

Like his father, Chulalongkorn fully appreciated the importance 
of education. He founded three schools on European lines for chil- 
dren of the royal family and government officials, including one 
for girls. Specialized schools were attached to government depart- 
ments for the training of civil servants. Study abroad was en- 
couraged, and promising civil servants and military officers were 
sent to Europe for further education. In 1891 Prince Damrong went 
to Europe to study modern systems of education. Upon his return 
he became head of the new Ministry of Public Instruction, though 
he was obliged to assume the Ministry of Interior post a year later. 

The country's first railroads were built during Chulalongkorn' s 
reign, and a line was completed between Bangkok and Ayutthaya 
in 1897. This was extended farther north to Lop Buri in 1901 and 
to Sawankhalok in 1909. A rail line built south to Phetchaburi by 
1903 was eventually linked with British rail lines in peninsular 
Malaya. 

The Crisis of 1893 

The steady encroachment of the two most aggressive European 
powers in the region, Britain and France, gravely threatened Siam 
during the last years of the nineteenth century. To the west, Brit- 
ain completed its conquest of Burma in 1885 with the annexation 
of Upper Burma and the involuntary abdication of Burma's last 
king, Thibaw. To the south, the British were firmly established 
in the major Muslim states of the Malay Peninsula. 

Even more than Britain, France posed a serious danger to 
Siamese independence. The French occupied Cochinchina 
(southern Vietnam, around the Mekong Delta) in 1863. From there 
they extended their influence into Cambodia, over which Vietnam 
and Siam had long been struggling for control. Assuming Vietnam's 



22 



Historical Setting 



traditional interests, France obliged the Cambodian king, Norodom, 
to accept a French protectorate. Siam formally relinquished its claim 
to Cambodia four years later, in return for French recognition of 
Siamese sovereignty over the Cambodian provinces of Siem Reap 
and Battambang. 

The French dreamed of outflanking their British rivals by 
developing a trade route to the supposed riches of southwestern 
China through the Mekong Valley. This seemed possible once 
France had assumed complete control over Vietnam in the 1880s. 
The small Laotian kingdoms, under Siamese suzerainty, were the 
keys to this dream. The French claimed these territories, arguing 
that areas previously under Vietnamese control should now come 
under the French, the new rulers of Vietnam. 

Auguste Pavie, French vice consul in Luang Prabang in 1886, 
was the chief agent in furthering French interests in Laos. His in- 
trigues, which took advantage of Siamese weakness in the region 
and periodic invasions by Chinese rebels from Yunnan Province, 
increased tensions between Bangkok and Paris. When fighting broke 
out between French and Siamese forces in Laos in April 1893, the 
French sent gunboats to blockade Bangkok. At gunpoint, the 
Siamese agreed to the cession of Laos. Britain's acquiescence in 
French expansionism was evident in a treaty signed by the two coun- 
tries in 1896 recognizing a border between French territory in Laos 
and British territory in Upper Burma. 

French pressure on Siam continued, however, and in 1907 
Chulalongkorn was forced to surrender Battambang and Siem Reap 
to French-occupied Cambodia. Two years later, Siam relinquished 
its claims to the northern Malay states of Kelantan, Trengganu, 
Kedah, and Perlis to the British in exchange for legal jurisdiction 
over British subjects on its soil and a large loan for railroad con- 
struction. In terms of territory under its control, Siam was now 
much diminished. Its independence, however, had been preserved 
as a useful and generally stable buffer state between French and 
British territories, (see fig. 6). 

Chulalongkorn' s son and successor, Vajiravudh (Rama VI, 
1910-25), had received his education in Britain. As much as the 
theme of modernization had typified the policies of his father, 
Vajiravudh' s reign was characterized by support of nationalism. 
The king wrote extensively on nationalist themes. He also organized 
and financed a military auxiliary, the Wild Tiger Corps, which 
he looked on as a means of spreading nationalist fervor. 

Thai nationalist attitudes at all levels of society were colored by 
anti-Chinese sentiment. For centuries members of the Chinese com- 
munity had dominated domestic commerce and had been employed 



23 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 6. Siam in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries 



24 



Historical Setting 



as agents for the royal trade monopoly. With the rise of European 
economic influence many Chinese entrepreneurs had shifted to 
opium traffic and tax collecting, both despised occupations. In addi- 
tion, Chinese millers and middlemen in the rice trade were blamed 
for the economic recession that gripped Siam for nearly a decade 
after 1905. Accusations of bribery of high officials, wars between 
the Chinese secret societies, and use of oppressive practices to extract 
taxes also served to inflame Thai opinion against the Chinese com- 
munity at a time when it was expanding rapidly as a result of 
increased immigration from China. By 1910 nearly 10 percent of 
Thailand's population was Chinese. Whereas earlier immigrants 
had intermarried with the Thai, the new arrivals frequently came 
with families and resisted assimilation into Thai society. Chinese 
nationalism, encouraged by Sun Yat-sen, the leader of the Chinese 
revolution, had also begun to develop, parallel with Thai nation- 
alism. The Chinese community even supported a separate school 
system for its children. Legislation in 1909 requiring adoption of 
surnames was in large part directed against the Chinese commu- 
nity, whose members would be faced with the choice of forsaking 
their Chinese identity or accepting the status of foreigners. Many 
of them made the accommodation and opted to become Thai — if 
in name only. Those who did not became even more alienated from 
the rest of Thai society (see The Non-Tai Minorities, ch. 2). 

To the consternation of his advisers, who still smarted from 
Siam's territorial losses to France, Vajiravudh declared war on Ger- 
many and took Siam into World War I on the side of the Allies, 
sending a token expeditionary force to the Western front. This 
limited participation, however, won Siam favorable amendments 
to its treaties with France and Britain at the end of the war and 
also gained a windfall in impounded German shipping for its mer- 
chant marine. Siam took part in the Versailles peace conference 
in 1919 and was a founding member of the League of Nations. 

Beginning of the Constitutional Era 

Early in his reign, King Prajadhipok (Rama VII, 1925-35) 
showed a tendency to share responsibility for political decision mak- 
ing with his ministers. He also appointed an advisory council to 
study the possibility of providing the country with a constitution, 
but its royalist members advised against such a measure. The civil 
bureaucracy, by contrast, considered the time ripe for such a move. 
Siam faced severe economic problems because of the world depres- 
sion, which had caused a sharp drop in the price of rice. Discon- 
tent among the political elite grew in reaction to retrenchment in 
government spending, which necessitated severe cutbacks in the 



25 



Thailand: A Country Study 



numbers of civil servants and military personnel, the demotion in 
rank of others, and the cancellation of government programs. 

1932 Coup 

The long era of absolute monarchy was brought to a sudden end 
on June 24, 1932, by a bloodless coup d'etat engineered by a group 
of civil servants and army officers with the support of army units 
in the Bangkok area. The action was specifically directed against 
ministers of the conservative royal government and not against the 
person of the king. Three days after the coup a military junta put 
into effect a provisional constitution drawn up by a young law 
professor, Pridi Phanomyong. Prajadhipok reluctantly accepted the 
new situation that had stripped him of his political power but in 
principle had left the prestige of the monarchy unimpaired. 

The coup leaders, who were known as the "promoters," were 
representative of the younger generation of Western-oriented 
political elite that had been educated to be instruments of an abso- 
lute monarchy — an institution they now viewed as archaic and in- 
adequate to the task of modern government. The principals in the 
coup identified themselves as nationalists, and none questioned the 
institution of the monarchy. Their numbers included the major 
figures in Thai politics for the next three decades. Pridi, one of 
the country's leading intellectuals, was the most influential civilian 
promoter. His chief rival among the other promoters was Phibun, 
or Luang Plaek Phibunsongkhram, an ambitious junior army officer 
who later attained the rank of field marshal. Phahon, or Phraya 
Phahonphonphayuhasena, the senior member of the group, 
represented old-line military officers dissatisfied with cuts in ap- 
propriations for the armed forces. These three exercised power as 
members of a cabinet, the Commissariat of the People, chosen by 
the National Assembly that had been summoned by the promoters 
soon after the coup. To assuage conservative opinion, a retired 
jurist, Phraya Manopakorn, was selected as prime minister. 

A permanent constitution was promulgated before the end of 
1932. It provided for a quasi-parliamentary regime in which 
executive power was vested in a unicameral legislature, the National 
Assembly, of which half of the members were elected by limited 
suffrage and half appointed by the government in power. The con- 
stitution provided that the entire legislature would be elected when 
half of the electorate had received four years of schooling or after 
ten years had elapsed, whichever came first. The National Assembly 
was responsible for the budget and could override a royal veto. 
Real power resided with the promoters, however, and was exercised 



26 



Historical Setting 



with army backing through their political organization, the Peo- 
ple's Party. 

A rift soon developed within the ranks of the promoters between 
civilian technicians and military officers. As finance minister, Pridi 
proposed a radical economic plan in 1933, calling for the nation- 
alization of natural resources. This plan was unacceptable to 
Manopakorn and the more conservative military members in the 
cabinet. The prime minister closed the National Assembly, in which 
Pridi had support, and ruled by decree. Accused of being a com- 
munist, Pridi fled into exile, but army officers opposing the civilian 
prime minister's move staged a coup in June 1933 that turned out 
Manopakorn, restored the National Assembly, and set up a new 
government headed by Phahon. With sentiment running in his 
favor, Pridi was permitted to return to Bangkok and was subse- 
quently cleared of the charges against him. 

In addition to factionalism within the cabinet, the government 
was also confronted with a serious royalist revolt in October 1933. 
The revolt was led by the king's cousin, Prince Boworadet, who 
had been defense minister during the old regime. Although the king 
gave no support to the prince, relations between Prajadhipok and 
the political leaders deteriorated thereafter. 

The first parliamentary elections in the country's history were 
held in November 1933. Although fewer than 10 percent of the 
eligible voters cast their ballots, they confirmed Pridi' s popularity. 
Pridi and his supporters in the civilian left wing of the People's 
Party were countered by a military faction that rallied around his 
rival, Phibun. In 1934 Phibun was named defense minister and 
proceeded to use his ministerial powers to build his political con- 
stituency within the army. Campaigning for a stronger military 
establishment in order to keep the country out of foreign hands, 
he took every opportunity to assert the superior efficiency of the 
military administration over the civilian bureaucracy, which looked 
to Pridi for leadership. Prime Minister Phahon had to maintain 
a precarious balance between the Pridi and Phibun factions in the 
government. 

The civilian conservatives had been discredited during the 
Manopakorn regime and by the support some had given to the 
royalist revolt. Their loss of influence deprived the king of effec- 
tive political allies in the government. In March 1935, Prajadhipok 
abdicated without naming a successor, charging the Phahon govern- 
ment with abuse of power in curtailing the royal veto. He went 
into retirement in Britain. His ten-year-old nephew, Ananda 
Mahidol (Rama VIII, 1935-46), who was attending school in 
Switzerland, was named king to succeed him, and a regency council, 



27 



Thailand: A Country Study 

which included Pridi, was appointed to carry out those functions 
of the monarchy retained under the constitution. The new king 
did not return to his country until 1945. 

Phibun and the Nationalist Regime 

The promoters, both civilian and military, had given their 
political movement a nationalist label, but unanimity among them 
went no further than acceptance of the official ideology. Although 
it was essential for the stability of any cabinet that they work 
together, relations between the civilian and military factions steadily 
deteriorated as more civil offices went to military personnel. Sens- 
ing a tendency toward military rule that he could no longer con- 
tain, Phahon retired in December 1938. Phibun took office as prime 
minister, with his rival, Pridi, as finance minister. 

The Phibun regime sold nationalism to the public by using 
propaganda methods borrowed from authoritarian regimes in 
Europe, and nationalism was equated with Westernization. To 
make clear to the world — in Phibun' s words — that the country be- 
longed to the Thai, in 1939 the name of the country was officially 
changed to Muang Thai (Land of the Free), or Thailand. That 
same year Pridi introduced his "Thailand for the Thai" economic 
plan, which levied heavy taxes on foreign-owned businesses, the 
majority of them Chinese, while offering state subsidies to Thai- 
owned enterprises. The government encouraged the Thai to emu- 
late European fashions, decreeing, for example, that shoes and hats 
be worn in public. Betel chewing was prohibited, and opium addicts 
were prosecuted and, if Chinese, deported. 

Although nationalism was equated with Westernization, it was 
not pro- Western, either politically or culturally. Thai Christians, 
especially those in government service, as well as Muslims, suffered 
official discrimination. The clear inference of government state- 
ments was that only Buddhists could be Thai patriots. At its source 
Thai nationalism was anti-Chinese in character. Regulations were 
enacted to check Chinese immigration and to reserve for the Thai 
numerous occupations that had formerly been held predominantly 
by Chinese. 

Phibun's nationalist regime also revived irredentist claims, stir- 
ring up anti- French sentiment and supporting restoration of former 
Thai territories in Cambodia and Laos. Seeking support against 
France, Phibun cultivated closer relations with Japan. The Thai 
nationalists looked to Japan as the model of an Asian country that 
had used Western methods and technology to achieve rapid modern- 
ization. As Thailand confronted the French in Indochina, the Thai 
looked to Japan as the only Asian country to challenge the European 



28 



Ruins of Thai capital at Ayutthaya 
Courtesy Tourism Authority of Thailand 

powers successfully. Although the Thai were united in their demand 
for the return of the lost provinces, Phibun's enthusiasm for the 
Japanese was markedly greater than that of Pridi, and many old 
conservatives as well viewed the course of the prime minister's for- 
eign policy with misgivings. 

World War II 

Thailand responded pragmatically to the military and political 
pressures of World War II. When sporadic fighting broke out 
between Thai and French forces along Thailand's eastern frontier 
in late 1940 and early 1941 , Japan used its influence with the Vichy 
regime in France to obtain concessions for Thailand. As a result, 
France agreed in March 1941 to cede 54,000 square kilometers of 
Laotian territory west of the Mekong and most of the Cambodian 
province of Battambang to Thailand. The recovery of this lost ter- 
ritory and the regime's apparent victory over a European colonial 
power greatly enhanced Phibun's reputation. 

Then, on December 8, 1941, after several hours of fighting 
between Thai and Japanese troops at Chumphon, Thailand had 
to accede to Japanese demands for access through the country for 
Japanese forces invading Burma and Malaya. Phibun assured 
the country that the Japanese action was prearranged with a 
sympathetic Thai government. Later in the month Phibun signed 



29 



Thailand: A Country Study 

a mutual defense pact with Japan. Pridi resigned from the cabinet 
in protest but subsequently accepted the nonpolitical position of 
regent for the absent Ananda Mahidol. 

Under pressure from Japan, the Phibun regime declared war 
on Britain and the United States in January 1942, but the Thai 
ambassador in Washington, Seni Pramoj, refused to deliver the 
declaration to the United States government. Accordingly, the 
United States refrained from declaring war on Thailand. With 
American assistance Seni, a conservative aristocrat whose anti- 
Japanese credentials were well established, organized the Free Thai 
Movement, recruiting Thai students in the United States to work 
with the United States Office of Strategic Services (OSS). The OSS 
trained Thai personnel for underground activities, and units were 
readied to infiltrate Thailand. From the office of the regent in 
Thailand, Pridi ran a clandestine movement that by the end of the 
war had with Allied aid armed more than 50,000 Thai to resist 
the Japanese. 

Thailand was rewarded for Phibun 's close cooperation with Japan 
during the early years of war with the return of further territory 
that had once been under Bangkok's control, including portions 
of the Shan states in Burma and the four northernmost Malay states. 
Japan meanwhile had stationed 150,000 troops on Thai soil and 
built the infamous "death railway" through Thailand using Allied 
prisoners of war. 

As the war dragged on, however, the Japanese presence grew 
more irksome. Trade came to a halt, and Japanese military per- 
sonnel requisitioning supplies increasingly dealt with Thailand as 
a conquered territory rather than as an ally. Allied bombing raids 
damaged Bangkok and other targets and caused several thousand 
casualties. Public opinion and, even more important, the sympa- 
thies of the civilian political elite, moved perceptibly against the 
Phibun regime and the military. In June 1944, Phibun was forced 
from office and replaced by the first predominantly civilian govern- 
ment since the 1932 coup. 

Pridi and the Civilian Regime, 1944-47 

The new government was headed by Khuang Aphaiwong, a 
civilian linked politically with conservatives like Seni. The most 
influential figure in the regime, however, was Pridi, whose anti- 
Japanese views were increasingly attractive to the Thai. In the last 
year of the war, Allied agents were tacitly given free access by 
Bangkok. As the war came to an end, Thailand repudiated its war- 
time agreements with Japan. 



30 



Historical Setting 



The civilian leaders, however, were unable to achieve unity. After 
a falling-out with Pridi, Khuang was replaced as prime minister 
by the regent's nominee, Seni, who had returned to Thailand from 
his post in Washington. The scramble for power among factions 
in late 1945 created political divisions in the ranks of the civilian 
leaders that destroyed their potential for making a common stand 
against the resurgent political force of the military in the postwar 
years. 

Postwar accommodations with the Allies also weakened the 
civilian government. As a result of the contributions made to the 
Allied war efforts by the Free Thai Movement, the United States, 
which unlike the other Allies had never officially been at war with 
Thailand, refrained from dealing with Thailand as an enemy coun- 
try in postwar peace negotiations. Before signing a peace treaty, 
however, Britain demanded war reparations in the form of rice for 
shipment to Malaya, and France refused to permit admission of 
Thailand to the United Nations (UN) until Indochinese territo- 
ries annexed during the war were returned. The Soviet Union 
insisted on the repeal of anticommunist legislation. 

The government set up an agency to manage the delivery of rice 
as part of Thai war reparations. These reparations were initially 
to total 1.5 million tons, or approximately 10 percent of the annual 
yield, but the figure was adjusted downward, and the reparations 
were paid off within two years. However, the government retained 
the policy of regulating the rice trade as an income-producing 
device. 

The Seni government survived only until the peace treaty with 
Britain was signed in January 1946. Public discontent grew — the 
result of inflation, the reparation payments to the British, the sur- 
render of territorial gains that many Thai considered to have been 
legitimate, and mismanagement at every level of government. Pridi 
restored Khuang to office for a time but in March 1 946 was obliged 
to assume the prime ministership himself in an effort to restore 
confidence in the civilian regime. 

Pridi, who argued that the strength of any civilian regime 
depended on a functioning parliament, worked with his cabinet 
to draft a new constitution that established parliamentary struc- 
tures. The constitution, promulgated in May 1946, called for a 
bicameral legislature. The lower house, the House of Representa- 
tives, was elected by popular vote; the upper house, the Senate, 
was elected by the lower house. This constitution was tailor made 
for Pridi 's purposes, ensuring him a parliamentary majority that 
would support his programs. 



31 



Thailand: A Country Study 



The 1946 election, which had in fact preceded enactment of the 
constitution, was the first in which political parties participated. 
Two coalition parties — Pridi's own party, the Constitutional Front, 
and the Cooperation Party — won a large majority of seats in 
the lower house and, in turn, sent a pro-Pridi majority to the 
upper house. Parliamentary opposition was led by the Democrat 
(Prachathipat) Party, headed by Seni and Khuang. 

Pridi's prestige suffered permanent damage two weeks after the 
election of the upper house, however, when Ananda Mahidol, who 
had returned from Switzerland a few months earlier, was found 
dead in his bed at the palace, a bullet wound through his head. 
Although the official account attributed the king's death to an acci- 
dent, there was widespread doubt because few facts were made pub- 
lic. Rumors implicated Pridi. Two months later, in August, Pridi 
resigned on grounds of ill health and went abroad, leaving Luang 
Thamrongnawasawat as prime minister. 

The late king's younger brother, nineteen-year-old Bhumibol 
Adulyadej (Rama IX, 1946-), was chosen as successor to the throne. 
The new king had been born in the United States, had spent his 
childhood in Switzerland, and had gone to Thailand for the first 
time in 1945- with his brother. He returned to Switzerland to com- 
plete his schooling and did not return to Bangkok to take up his 
duties until 1951. 

Return of Phibun and the Military 

As a result of Pridi's fall from grace and the manner in which 
the civilian government that succeeded him handled the investi- 
gation of the king's death, Phibun 's military faction regained some 
of the stature that it had lost through its wartime association with 
the Japanese. Reviving the nationalistic theme of its years in power, 
Phibun 's group played on intense public resentment of the war repa- 
rations Thailand had to pay and the economic dislocation the pay- 
ments were believed to have caused. Army officers also blamed 
the civilian government for a humiliation the military suffered in 
1946 when their units, facing expatriated Chinese Guomindang 
(Kuomintang — KMT) forces in the north, were ordered to disband 
in the field and were left without supplies or transport. They also 
criticized the civilian government's conciliatory policy toward 
minorities — Chinese, Muslims, and hill tribes. 

Phibun had been arrested as a war criminal in 1945 but was 
released by the courts soon afterward. Always an efficient leader 
and known as a staunch anticommunist, Phibun had retained his 
constituency of supporters in the officer corps. Even the civilian 
elite, dismayed at the economic disorder and frightened at the rise 



32 



Historical Setting 



of communist insurgencies in neighboring countries, regarded him 
as an attractive candidate for office. Some observers contended that 
his rehabilitation had been due to United States influence. 

November 1947 Coup 

In November 1947, the so-called Coup d'Etat Group, led by two 
retired generals and backed by Phibun, seized power from the 
civilian government. Pridi, who had recently returned from his 
world tour, fled the country again and eventually took refuge in 
China. The coup leaders appointed an interim government headed 
by Khuang and promised a new constitution. General elections held 
in January 1948 confirmed support for the junta, particularly the 
Phibun faction. In order to placate conservative civilian supporters, 
Khuang was retained as prime minister until he proved too indepen- 
dent in his policies. In April 1948, Phibun — by then a field 
marshal — forcibly removed Khuang from office and took over as 
prime minister. 

For the next three years Phibun struggled to maintain his govern- 
ment against numerous attempted coups by rival military factions. 
To build support, he allowed disaffected political groups, includ- 
ing Khuang' s conservative Democrat Party, to participate in draft- 
ing a new constitution, which was promulgated in 1949. When 
leaders of an anti-Phibun army group were arrested in October 
1948, supporters of former prime ministers Pridi and Khuang in 
the navy and the marines were not seized. In February 1949, a 
revolt allegedly sponsored by Pridi supporters in the marines and 
navy was suppressed after three days of fighting. In June 1951, 
marine and navy troops again rebelled and abducted Phibun. The 
revolt, which was put down by loyal army and air force units, 
resulted in a serious cutback of navy strength and a purge of senior 
naval officers. 

Phibun's policies during his second government (1948-57) were 
similar to those he had initiated in the late 1930s. He restored the 
use of the name Thailand in 1949. (In reaction to extreme nation- 
alism, there had been a reversion to the name Siam in 1946.) 
Legislation to make Thai social behavior conform to Western 
standards — begun by Phibun before the war — was reintroduced. 
Secondary education was improved, and military appropriations 
were substantially increased. The Phibun regime was also charac- 
terized by harassment of Chinese and the tendency to regard them 
as disloyal and, after 1949, as communists. 

Phibun's anticommunist position had great influence on his for- 
eign policy. Thailand refused to recognize the People's Republic 
of China, supported UN action in Korea in 1950, and backed the 



33 



Thailand: A Country Study 



French against communist insurgents in Indochina. Phibun's 
Thailand was regarded as the most loyal supporter of United States 
foreign policy in mainland Southeast Asia. 

November 1951 Coup 

By 1951 Phibun had begun to share political power with two 
associates who had participated with him in the 1947 coup that over- 
threw the civilian regime. One of these was General Phao Siyanon, 
director general of police and a close associate of Phibun since the 
original coup of 1932. The other, more junior, partner was General 
Sarit Thanarat, commander of the Bangkok garrison. As time 
passed, Phibun's stock within the military declined as a result of 
the plots against him. Phao and Sarit grew more powerful than 
Phibun, who was able to retain the prime ministership only because 
of their rivalry for the succession. 

In November 1951, military and police officers announced in 
a radio broadcast that the 1949 constitution was suspended by the 
government and that the 1932 constitution was in force. The rea- 
son given for restoring a unicameral parliament with half its mem- 
bership appointed by the government was the danger of communist 
aggression. Shortly after the government-engineered coup, King 
Bhumibol Adulyadej was called back to Thailand, and for the first 
time since 1935 an adult monarch resided in the palace in Bangkok. 
A revised constitution was promulgated in February 1952, and an 
election was held for seats in the new, single-house legislature, half 
of the members of which were to be appointed. Nearly all the ap- 
pointed parliamentary members were army officers. 

The Phibun-Phao-Sarit triumvirate continued to operate along 
the policy lines of the previous five years. In November 1952, the 
police announced the discovery of a communist plot against the 
government and began a series of arrests of Chinese. Many Chinese 
schools were closed and Chinese associations banned. The cam- 
paign against communists, with its anti-Chinese emphasis, gathered 
momentum throughout 1953. 

In 1 954 Thailand participated in the Manila meeting that resulted 
in the Southeast Asia Collective Defense Treaty, of which the 
Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) was the operative 
arm (see Foreign Affairs, ch. 4). The next year SEATO, which 
made its headquarters at Bangkok, was offered the use of military 
bases in Thailand. Relations with the United States continued to 
be cordial during this period, and substantial amounts of Ameri- 
can economic, technical, and military aid were provided. 

In 1955 the Thai government had imposed a restrictive export 
tax on rice — the controversial rice premium — and required that 



34 



Tanks in the streets of Bangkok following 1932 coup 
Courtesy New York Times Paris Collection, National Archives 

traders purchase rice export licenses. The ultimate goal of this tax 
was to nurture Thailand's developing industries and to discourage 
rice production. The government hoped the tax on tonnage of rice 
exported would drive the price of Thai rice in the world market 
beyond a competitive level, thus discouraging exports. The govern- 
ment then purchased the rice that could not be sold abroad to create 
a public rice reserve and sold it on the domestic market at artifi- 
cially low prices. 

By providing low-cost rice, the government hoped to hold down 
the cost of living in urban areas and prevent demands for higher 
wages, thereby making Thai industrial production more competi- 
tive on world markets. It also argued that the rice policy would 
encourage diversification in the agricultural sector as traditional 
rice farmers in the central plain turned to other cash crops — maize, 
sugarcane, and pineapple. Export controls had no effect however, 
on rice farmers in the North and Northeast, who produced glutinous 
rice for local consumption only. Introduction of the rice premium 
fundamentally altered the liberal policy toward free trade that had 
been in place since the Bowring Treaty, and it cast the Thai govern- 
ment in an activist economic role, such as that advocated by the 
nationalists since 1932 (see Mongkut's Opening to the West, this 
ch.). 



35 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Opponents of the rice policy charged that the rice premium was 
an excessive tax that ultimately placed the heaviest burden on 
small farmers in the central plain engaged in growing rice for ex- 
port, who were deprived of an increase in real income and were 
prevented from sharing in the benefits of Thailand's economic 
boom in the 1960s. Lacking incentive to increase their produc- 
tion, farmers planted less and refrained from introducing im- 
proved seeds or using costly fertilizers. Government officials, 
however, predicted that as rice production increased abroad, 
world and domestic prices would come together and end the need 
for the rice premium. 

Phibun's Experiment with "Democracy" 

The struggle for control of the Thai government continued, 
meanwhile, and Phibun attempted to offset Sarit's advantage among 
the military by generating popular support for himself. In 1955 
he toured the United States and Britain and, on his return to 
Thailand, articulated a policy of prachathipatai ("democracy"), which 
he stated he was giving to the country as a gift. Encouraging the 
public to feel free to criticize his "open regime," he set aside a 
portion of a central park near the royal palace in Bangkok for public 
debate, in emulation of Hyde Park in London, and gave the press 
free rein in covering the dissent expressed there. Criticism, espe- 
cially as it appeared in the press, was outspoken and often extreme 
in its attacks on the government. In addition to encouraging criti- 
cism, Phibun halted the anti-Chinese campaign, made plans to in- 
crease the responsibilities of local government, and again permitted 
political parties to register. Phibun intended more to convey the 
appearance of democracy, however, than to allow for its functional 
development. 

Phao and Phibun devoted much effort to ensuring a govern- 
ment victory in the general election scheduled for February 1957. 
Phao headed a newly founded government party, the Seri 
Manangkhasila, which was the largest and best funded of the 
twenty-five parties that had sprung up in response to prachathipatai. 
Sarit, on the other hand, kept out of the campaign and, after the 
election, dissociated himself from the disappointing results, which 
gave the Seri Manangkhasila a bare majority but saw half of the 
incumbent party members defeated. Sarit and others questioned 
even these returns and accused the government party of stuffing 
ballot boxes. When university students came out in great num- 
bers to protest the government's handling of the elections, Phibun 
declared a state of emergency and shelved prachathipatai. 



36 



Historical Setting 

Sarit and Thanom 

Phibun had failed to win the popular support that he had sought, 
and the effort cost him what remained of his standing among the 
military faction. As a result of the election, Phibun formed a new 
government in March 1957, appointing Phao as interior minister 
with responsibility for internal security. However, it was Sarit, 
whose prestige had not been at stake in the election, who as newly 
named armed forces commander in chief emerged as the strongest 
member of the ruling group. In September he openly broke with 
his colleagues, ordered tanks into the streets, and displaced Phibun 
and Phao in a bloodless coup d'etat. He suspended the constitu- 
tion and dissolved parliament. The king approved Sarit 's action; 
the royal family had opposed Phibun since the 1930s. 

New elections were held in December under an interim civilian 
government headed by Pote Sarasin, the secretary general of 
SEATO. No single party won a parliamentary majority, but Sarit 
organized a government party, the National Socialist Party, to con- 
tain the loose coalition of parties and individuals backing his re- 
gime. Because of poor health Sarit did not attempt to form a 
government but turned over responsibility to his deputy in the 
armed forces, Thanom Kittikachorn. Intraparty wrangling over 
political and economic spoils plagued Thanom 's government. The 
situation was further aggravated by the inclusion in the govern- 
ment party of left-wing politicians who opposed its pro-Western 
foreign policy. 

Sarit's Return 

In October 1958, Sarit, recently returned from the United States 
where he had undergone extensive medical treatment, took over 
personal control of the government with the consent of Thanom, 
who resigned as prime minister. Sarit, who spoke of instilling 
"national discipline" in the country, justified his action on the 
grounds that Thailand's various constitutional experiments had not 
succeeded in providing the stability needed for economic develop- 
ment. He outlawed political parties and jailed critics of the 
regime — teachers, students, labor leaders, journalists, and liberal 
parliamentarians. A dozen or more newspapers were closed. 

In January 1960, Sarit decreed an interim constitution that 
provided for an appointed assembly to draft a new constitution, 
Thailand's eighth since 1932. Work on the document continued 
throughout the 1960s. Sarit assumed the office of prime minister 
provided for in the interim constitution, but his regime was clearly 
that of a military dictatorship. 



37 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Whatever else might be said about its political shortcomings, 
Sarit's government was more dynamic than the previous regimes 
of the constitutional era. Sarit gave ministers in his cabinet con- 
siderable independence in the affairs of their own ministries. At 
the same time he made all major decisions and kept members of 
the government responsible solely to his office. 

Despite recurring scandals involving official corruption, in the 
early 1960s Sarit seemed to have succeeded in achieving political 
stability and economic growth. In 1961 the government instituted 
the first in a series of economic development schemes that were 
intended to foster employment and expand production. Although 
military officers were frequently appointed as directors of state and 
quasi- governmental economic enterprises, civilian personnel gradu- 
ally assumed a greater share in implementing government poli- 
cies. Sarit welcomed foreign investment and assured investors of 
government protection. Major electrification and irrigation projects 
began, with aid from the United States and international agen- 
cies. In addition, Sarit initiated a cleanup campaign to improve 
sanitation in the cities. 

Sarit revived the motto "Nation-Religion-King" as a fighting 
political slogan for his regime, which he characterized as combin- 
ing the paternalism of the ancient Thai state and the benevolent 
ideals of Buddhism. He spoke of his intention to "restore" the king, 
a retiring man, to active participation in national life, and he urged 
Bhumibol Adulyadej and his consort, Queen Sirikit, to have more 
contact with the Thai public, which had a strong affection for the 
monarchy. Royal tours were also scheduled for the king and queen 
to represent Thailand abroad. Sarit likewise played on the religious 
attachments of the people. In 1962 he centralized administration 
of monastic institutions under a superior patriarchate friendly to 
the regime, and he mobilized monks, especially in the North and 
Northeast, to support government programs. Critics protested that 
Sarit had demeaned religion by using it for political ends and had 
compromised the monarchy by using it to legitimize a military dic- 
tatorship. They asserted that the regime's policies, rather than 
restoring these institutions, had contributed to the growth of materi- 
alism and secularism and to the erosion of religious belief in the 
country. 

Under Sarit's guidance, Thailand's anticommunist policy con- 
tinued, and steps were taken to deal militarily with the growing 
threat of insurgency posed by communist-inspired activities in 
neighboring countries. Sarit sought closer ties with Thailand's anti- 
communist neighbors and with the United States, and in 1961 
Thailand and another SEATO member, the Philippines, joined 



38 



Prince Bhumibol Adulyadej (left) and King Ananda Mahidol (right) 

as schoolboys in Switzerland in 1940 
Courtesy New York Times Paris Collection, National Archives 

with newly independent Malaya (since 1963, Malaysia) to form 
the Association of Southeast Asia (ASA). The Pathet Lao (as the 
leftist Lao People's Liberation Army was known until 1965) moved 
into northwestern Laos in March 1962. United States secretary 
of state Dean Rusk and Thai foreign minister Thanat Khoman 
agreed that their countries would interpret the Southeast Asia Col- 
lective Defense Treaty of 1954 as a bilateral as well as multilateral 
pact binding the United States to come to the aid of Thailand in 
time of need, with or without the agreement of the other signers 
of the pact. Two months after the foreign ministers' agreement, 
President John F. Kennedy stationed United States troops in 
Thailand in response to the deteriorating situation in Laos. The 
arrival of the troops in May 1962 was seen by the Thai govern- 
ment as evidence of the United States commitment to preserving 
Thailand's independence and integrity against communist expan- 
sion. Despite United States pressure, however, Sarit refused to en- 
tertain ideas of democratic reform. 

Thai Politics and Foreign Policy, 1963-71 

In December 1963 Sarit died in office. His deputy, Thanom, 
peacefully succeeded to the prime ministership and pursued with- 
out major modifications the foreign and domestic policies of his 



39 



Thailand: A Country Study 

predecessor. Retaining the cabinet that he inherited from Sarit, 
Thanom focused his efforts on seeking to maintain political stabil- 
ity; promoting economic development, especially in security- 
sensitive areas; raising the standard of living; and safeguarding the 
country from the communist threat at home and abroad. 

A notable departure from Sarit's policies, however, was the Tha- 
nom government's decision to shorten the timetable for the coun- 
try's transition from the military-dominated leadership structure 
to a popularly elected government. The prime minister urged the 
Constituent Assembly, appointed in 1959, to finish drafting a con- 
stitution as soon as practicable. The new leadership also relaxed 
stringent official controls on the press, an attempt that the authorities 
said was aimed at creating a new, relatively liberalized, political 
climate. 

Although the leaders agreed on the desirability of establishing 
what they described as a more democratic political system in tune 
with the country's heritage, there were indications that they dis- 
agreed on the pace of the projected change. Some leading officials 
thought that an early resumption of political activities would 
broaden the base of politics and strengthen popular identification 
with the government, the monarchy, and Buddhism. Others argued 
that the restoration of party politics at a time when the country 
was confronted with serious internal problems was likely to aid the 
communists in their efforts to infiltrate civic, labor, student, and 
political organizations. 

The constitution was finally proclaimed in June 1968, but mar- 
tial law, which had been imposed in 1958, remained in effect. Party 
politics were legalized and resumed shortly after mid- 1968, and 
general elections for the new National Assembly were held in 
February 1969. Thanom 's United Thai People's Party returned 
75 members to the 219-seat lower house, giving them the largest 
representation of the 13 parties, while the second-running Democrat 
Party won 57 seats. 

Thailand's annual economic growth rate in the 1960s and early 
1970s averaged a booming 8 percent, much of it attributable to 
United States military expenditures there during the years of its 
involvement in Vietnam. An increased flow of foreign exchange 
resulted from United States and multilateral aid loans as well as 
from foreign investment, which came primarily from Japan, the 
United States, and Taiwan. 

Foreign policy concerns focused on neighboring Laos, where it 
was believed a Pathet Lao victory would destabilize the North and 
Northeast and open Thailand to a direct attack by communist 
forces. Thailand allied itself closely with the United States position 



40 



Historical Setting 



in the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam), permitting bases in 
Thailand to be used for raids on both the Democratic Republic 
of Vietnam (North Vietnam) and Cambodia. Although more than 
45,000 United States troops and 500 combat aircraft were stationed 
in the country by 1968, their mission was not officially acknowledged 
for fear of possible communist retaliation against Thailand. Sarit 
also committed a division of Thai army troops to the war in South 
Vietnam. 

President Lyndon B. Johnson's March 1968 announcement that 
the United States would halt bombing in North Vietnam and seek 
a negotiated settlement came as a blow to the Thai government, 
which had not been consulted on the change in policy. Although 
the defense of Thailand clearly remained essential to the security 
of Southeast Asia in United States strategic thinking, no provision 
was made for Laos, whose security the Thai saw as essential to 
their own defense. 

While remaining loyal to its commitments, Thailand thereafter 
determined to restore flexibility to its foreign policy by moving away 
from one-sided dependence on the United States. The military, 
however, was anxious to continue Thailand's active involvement 
in South Vietnam and in Laos, where several thousand Thai 
"volunteers" were engaged against the Pathet Lao. Thanom urged 
United States backing for the Lon Nol regime in Cambodia in 1970 
and proposed a formal alliance linking Thailand with Laos, Cam- 
bodia, and South Vietnam that would give the conflict in Southeast 
Asia the appearance of a war being fought by Asian anticommunists 
for Asian security. The plan failed to get United States support. 

Communist activities in Laos and Malaya had already begun 
to affect the domestic situation in the South and the Northeast in 
the 1950s, and by the 1960s they presented a problem of increas- 
ing magnitude. Communist guerrillas, mostly ethnic Chinese, oper- 
ated in jungle areas north of the Thai-Malayan border, where they 
had taken refuge from Commonwealth of Nations security forces 
during the 1948-60 Emergency in Malaya. A more serious threat 
in that same region were the Muslim insurgents of the Pattani 
National Liberation Front, a Thai separatist group composed of 
ethnic Malays. Meanwhile, in the northern provinces dissident Meo 
tribesmen reportedly had begun receiving training and arms from 
the Pathet Lao by 1950. In the Northeast, underground leftist par- 
ties took advantage of grievances over relatively poor economic and 
social conditions to rally opposition to the government. Faced with 
the problems in the South, North, and Northeast, the Bangkok 
government frequently identified regional unrest and protest against 
ethnic and economic policies with the genuine communist-based 



41 



Thailand: A Country Study 

insurgencies that overlapped and often benefited from it. Opposi- 
tion groups and critics of the regime in Bangkok were also gener- 
ally labeled as communists. 

November 1971 Coup 

In November 1971, Prime Minister Thanom executed a coup 
against his own government, thereby ending the three-year experi- 
ment with what had passed for parliamentary democracy. The 1968 
constitution was suspended, political parties banned, and undis- 
guised military rule imposed on the country. Under the new regime, 
executive and legislative authority was held by a military junta, 
the National Executive Council. Heading the council was a tri- 
umvirate that included Thanom, who retained the office of prime 
minister; Field Marshal Praphat Charusathian, his deputy prime 
minister; and Thanom' s son (also Praphat' s son-in-law), Narong 
Kittikachorn, an army colonel. 

Despite stern moves to suppress opposition, popular dissatisfac- 
tion with the dictatorial regime mounted in the universities and 
labor organizations as well as among rival military factions. The 
discontent focused on United States support for Thanom, the 
growth of Japanese economic influence, and the official corrup- 
tion that the regime made no effort to conceal. The civilian politi- 
cal elite joined students and workers in opposing Thanom 's 
apparent aim to perpetuate a political dynasty through his son, 
Narong, whose rise the officer corps particularly resented. 
Thanom 's aggrandizement of his family was at odds with the im- 
age he tried to project and the standards of the "civic religion" 
with its call for veneration of ''Nation-Religion-King." The tri- 
umvirate also ignored the king, who had moderated his earlier 
enthusiasm for Thanom, and opponents charged that the junta dis- 
regarded religion. Some critics detected signs of republicanism in 
the regime and feared another Thanom-sponsored coup to over- 
throw the monarchy. 

Thailand in Transition 

In December 1972, Thanom announced a new interim consti- 
tution that provided for a totally appointed legislative assembly, 
two-thirds of the members of which would be drawn from the mili- 
tary and police. This move provoked widespread protest, however, 
especially among students and led to Thanom' s eventual removal. 
In May and June 1973, students and workers rallied in the streets 
to demand a more democratic constitution and genuine parliamen- 
tary elections. By early October, there was renewed violence, pro- 
testing the detention of eleven students arrested for handing out 



42 



Prime Minister Phibunsongkhram meeting with 
President Dwight D. Eisenhower and other United States 

government officials 
Courtesy National Archives 

antigovernment pamphlets. The demonstrations grew in size and 
scope as students demanded an end to the military dictatorship. 
On October 13, more than 250,000 people rallied in Bangkok before 
the Democracy Memorial, in the largest demonstration of its kind 
in Thai history, to press their grievances against the government. 

The next day troops opened fire on the demonstrators, killing 
seventy-five, and occupied the campus of Thammasat University. 
King Bhumibol, who had been seeking Thanom's ouster, took a 
direct role in dealing with the crisis in order to prevent further 
bloodshed and called Thanom and his cabinet to Chitralada Palace 
for talks. In the evening, the king went on television and radio to 
announce a compromise solution: Thanom had resigned as prime 
minister but would remain as supreme commander of the armed 
forces. In consultation with student leaders, the king appointed 
Sanya Dharmasakti (Sanya Thammasak) as interim prime minister, 
with instructions to draft a new constitution. Sanya, a civilian con- 
servative, was the rector of Thammasat University and known to 
be sympathetic to the students' position. On October 15, Thanom, 
Praphat, and Narong — dubbed Thailand's "three most hated 
men" — were allowed to leave the country in secret, the king over- 
ruling student militants who wanted to put them on trial. Their 



43 



Thailand: A Country Study 

departure was announced to the public only after they had left the 
country, Praphat and Narong for Taiwan and Thanom initially 
for the United States. 

The student demonstrations of 1973 had not been intended as 
a prelude to a revolution. They resulted, at least in part, from the 
frustration of large numbers of students who were unable to fulfill 
professional expectations after graduation, partly because univer- 
sity enrollment had increased dramatically in the 1960s and early 
1970s (see Education and the Arts, ch. 2). Students were careful, 
however, to legitimize their actions against the military dictator- 
ship by an appeal to religion and the monarchy, displaying in the 
streets the symbols of the "civic religion" — figures of Buddha, pic- 
tures of the king, and the national flag. 

Prime Minister Sanya gave full credit to the student movement 
for bringing down the military dictatorship. At the state ceremony 
honoring those who had been killed during the 1973 demonstra- 
tions, he pledged, "Their death has brought us democracy which 
we will preserve forever." However, political change in Thailand 
did not bring the shift to the left that had been hoped for by some 
and feared by many. Student militants, who already felt betrayed 
by the king's complicity in Thanom 's escape, were not satisfied 
with the direction taken by the new government, which seemed 
to have been preempted by the professional politicians. 

The new constitution, which went into effect in October 1974, 
called for a popularly elected House of Representatives and elec- 
tions within 120 days. Political parties proliferated following the 
passage in 1974 of legislation permitting their registration. As a 
result, the January 1975 parliamentary elections were inconclu- 
sive. With forty-two officially sanctioned parties in the field, none 
won a parliamentary majority. The parties for the most part had 
been organized around familiar political personalities, and few had 
offered any ideological base or even specific programs. Only 47 
percent of eligible voters cast ballots; public cynicism about politi- 
cians and improper management of voter registration were blamed 
for the relatively low turnout. According to observers, however, 
the election was not openly corrupt. 

The election put a large bloc of right-wing and centrist parties 
in control of nearly 90 percent of the seats. None could be described 
as reformist, and, to a degree, all represented the status quo. On 
the left, a small and inexperienced but idealistic group advocated 
land redistribution and favored neutrality in foreign affairs. Seni 
Pramoj, whose Democrat Party was the largest in the right-wing 
bloc, formed a shaky government that could depend on only 91 
of the 269 votes in the House of Representatives. It fell within a 



44 



Historical Setting 



month, after failing to win a vote of confidence. In March Seni's 
brother, Kukrit Pramoj, leader of the small, right-wing Social 
Action (Kit Sangkhom) Party, was able to put together a more stable 
centrist coalition. During his year in office, Kukrit proposed such 
reforms as decentralizing economic planning to put development 
in the hands of locally elected committees, but measures of this 
nature were repeatedly defeated as members of the National 
Assembly rallied to protect their vested interests. 

The overthrow of the ThanOm regime had brought on a more 
vocal questioning of ties with the United States. Nationalist sen- 
timent, which was frequently expressed in terms of anti- 
Americanism, ran high among students, who protested alleged 
American involvement in domestic Thai affairs and called for the 
speedy withdrawal of United States forces. Moreover, the changed 
geopolitical situation in Southeast Asia refocused the issue of the 
United States presence. Many Thai concluded that the country 
could not be reconciled with its communist neighbors as long as 
United States personnel were stationed on Thai soil. 

The pullout of the 27,000 United States military personnel in 
Thailand began in March 1975 and was completed in mid- 1976 
(see Foreign Security Assistance, ch. 5). The Thai government 
stressed the need for continued United States military commitment 
in Southeast Asia, but from Bangkok's standpoint, the emphasis 
in relations between the two allies clearly shifted from one of mili- 
tary cooperation to economic and technical cooperation. United 
States-Thai relations were dealt a setback, however, by the 
Mayaguez incident in May 1975, when the United States used the 
airfield at Ban U Taphao without Thai consent as a staging base 
for the rescue of an American freighter detained by the Khmer 
Rouge. The incident was seen as a blow to Thai sovereignty and 
touched off anti-American demonstrations in Bangkok. 

When South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia came under com- 
munist control in the spring of 1975, the Thai government's ini- 
tial reaction was to seek an accommodation with the victors, but 
feelers extended to Hanoi met with a chilly reception. In July, 
however, Thailand established diplomatic relations with China, after 
two years of negotiations. That same year, Thailand became active 
in regional technical and economic cooperation as part of the 
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), of which it had 
been a member since the organization's founding in 1967 (see For- 
eign Affairs, ch. 4). 

In addition to political changes, both in its own government and 
in its relationship with other powers, Thailand also experienced 
economic shifts. Kukrit 's government was plagued by labor unrest 



45 



Thailand: A Country Study 

and rising prices. The economic boom that had spurred employ- 
ment and produced an apparent prosperity in the 1960s fizzled with 
the phasing out of United States military expenditures in Thailand. 
Furthermore, the impressive economic growth was insufficient to 
keep pace with the growth of the population, which had increased 
from 26 million in 1960 to 34 million in 1970. Although agricul- 
tural yield per hectare remained static, agricultural production kept 
up with population growth during the 1960s and 1970s because 
the amount of land under cultivation doubled during that period. 
Arable land reserves were being used up by the mid-1970s, however, 
except in the southern peninsula. Moreover, although increasing 
rice production had indeed brought together world and domestic 
rice prices, as government leaders of the 1960s had predicted, the 
premium nevertheless remained in effect. Its purpose now was to 
augment government revenues. More than US$40 million was 
derived from the rice premium in 1975, much of it earmarked, 
according to government sources, for agricultural development 
schemes as a form of income distribution. 

The low incomes imposed by the rice premium and the lack of 
available credit adversely affected small owner-operated farms in 
the central plain's rice bowl that produced for the export market. 
Farmers left the land either to become wage laborers on large farms 
or to secure industrial and service jobs in the cities. This migra- 
tion to the cities was evident in the dramatic growth of the Bangkok- 
Thon Buri metropolitan area, where population exploded by 250 
percent in the 1960s and 1970s to exceed 4.5 million in 1980. 

Maintaining order was the most pressing problem facing the 
parliamentary regime and the most difficult one to resolve. For 
one thing, the communist-inspired insurgency persisted and gener- 
ated a mistrust of all dissidents (see Insurgency, ch. 5). The radicali- 
zation of the student movement was attributed to communist 
influence, and student leaders were regularly accused of being agents 
for Beijing and Hanoi. Particularly after the fall of South Viet- 
nam, Laos, and Cambodia, all dissidents were likely to be labeled 
communists by the military and by right-wing politicians. Even 
in moderate government circles, misgivings were expressed about 
continued student activism and the growth of militancy against the 
monarchy. In April 1975, fourteen labor organizers and student 
leaders were arrested under anticommunist legislation used for the 
first time since Thanom's overthrow. 

Adding to these political tensions were the plethora of new 
newspapers that came into existence after censorship and restric- 
tions on the press were lifted in 1973. Although most were too small 
to be economically viable, they gave a voice to political factions 



46 



Ruins of Khmer city of Phimai (thirteenth century) 

in northeastern Thailand 
Courtesy Tourism Authority of Thailand 

of every persuasion and produced a cacophony with which many 
had difficulty coping. News reporting was a low priority for many 
newspapers, some of which operated solely as rumor mills engag- 
ing in extortion and blackmail. Government officials admitted that 
they were intimidated by the press. 

Political murders and bombing became commonplace as open 
warfare broke out between leftist students and workers and rightist 
paramilitary groups, the latter openly supported by the police. In 
August 1975, police in Bangkok, striking to protest government 
weakness toward leftist students, went on a rampage through the 
Thammasat University campus. Several senior military officers and 
civilian conservatives formed the ultranationalist Nawa Phon (New 
Force) movement to defend "Nation-Religion-King" against the 
students, and by mid- 1975 it claimed 50,000 members. A group 
of paramilitary vigilantes, the Red Gaurs (Red Bulls), recruited 
25,000 members, largely unemployed vocational graduates and tech- 
nical students, to disrupt student rallies and break strikes. The group 
was believed to have been organized by the police as an unofficial 
auxiliary. Another right-wing group with similar origins was the 
Village Scouts (Luk Sua Chaoban; literally, "village tiger cubs"). 

Right-wing power grew early in 1976, as pressure from the mili- 
tary forced Kukrit to resign after he had pressed corruption charges 



47 



Thailand: A Country Study 

against army officers. Violence during the parliamentary election 
campaign the following April left more than thirty dead, includ- 
ing Socialist Party leader Bunsanong Bunyothanyan, and the new 
alignment in the House of Representatives brought back Seni as 
prime minister at the head of a four-party, right-wing coalition. 

In August Praphat reappeared in Thailand and was received by 
the king. Although Seni asserted that he could not legally deport 
him, the former dictator's presence provoked widespread demon- 
strations that forced his return to Taiwan. The next month, 
however, Thanom was back in Thailand, garbed in a monk's robe 
and expressing his intention to enter a monastery. Despite renewed 
protests, the demoralized government allowed him to stay. 

Political tensions between leftist and rightist forces reached a 
bloody climax in October 1976. On October 5, right-wing news- 
papers in the capital published a photograph of student demon- 
strators at Thammasat University reenacting the strangling and 
hanging of two student protestors by police the previous month. 
The photograph, which was later found to have been altered, 
showed one of the students as being made up to resemble the king's 
son, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn. The right wing perceived the 
demonstration as a damning act of lese-majeste. That evening police 
surrounded the campus of Thammasat University, where 2,000 
students were holding a sit-in. Fighting between students and police 
(including contingents of the paramilitary Border Patrol Police) 
broke out. The following day, groups of Nawa Phon, Red Gaurs, 
and Village Scouts "shock troops" surged onto the campus and 
launched a bloody assault in which hundreds of students were killed 
and wounded and more than 1,000 arrested. That evening the mili- 
tary seized power, established the National Administrative Reform 
Council (NARC), and ended that phase of Thailand's intermit- 
tent experimentation with democracy. 

Military Rule and Limited Parliamentary 
Government, 1976-83 

With the support of the king and the military membership of 
NARC , a new government was formed under the prime minister- 
ship of Thanin Kraivichien, a former Supreme Court justice who 
had a reputation for honesty and integrity. Though a civilian, 
Thanin was a passionate anticommunist and established a regime 
that was in many ways more repressive than those of earlier mili- 
tary strongmen. He imposed strict censorship, placed unions under 
tight controls, and carried out anticommunist purges of the civil 
service and education institutions. Student leaders, driven under- 
ground by the October 1976 violence, left urban areas to join the 



48 



Historical Setting 



communist insurgency in the provinces. As a result of his harsh 
rule and a growing feeling within the political elite that university 
students, themselves members of the privileged classes, had been 
poorly treated, Thanin was replaced in October 1977 by General 
Kriangsak Chomanand. 

Kriangsak was more conciliatory than his civilian predecessor 
and promised a new constitution and elections by 1979. He courted 
moderate union leaders, raising the minimum daily wage in the 
Bangkok area in 1978 and again in 1979. He allowed limited press 
freedom, and he gave verbal support to the idea of land reform,, 
though no action in this area was forthcoming. In September 1978, 
he issued an amnesty for the "Bangkok 18" dissidents who had 
been arrested in the October 1976 violence and tried by military 
courts. 

A new constitution was promulgated in December 1978. The 
1978 Constitution established a bicameral legislature, the National 
Assembly, consisting of the popularly elected House of Represen- 
tatives (301 members) and the appointed Senate (225 members). 
The military controlled appointment to the Senate, and it could 
block House of Representatives initiatives in important areas such 
as national security, the economy, the budget, and votes of no con- 
fidence. The 1978 document also stipulated that the prime minister 
and cabinet ministers did not have to be popularly elected. When 
elections were held on schedule in April 1979, moderate rightist 
parties — the Social Action Party, the Thai Citizens' Party, and the 
Chart Thai (Thai Nation) Party — won the largest number of seats, 
whereas the Democrats lost most of their seats. 

Further changes came during 1979 and 1980, however, as eco- 
nomic conditions deteriorated in the wake of the second oil crisis. 
Uncontrolled inflation caused the standard of living to fall in urban 
areas, especially Bangkok, while government dilatoriness and cor- 
ruption in the villages stalled policies designed to help the farmers. 
In February 1980, the Kriangsak government announced sudden 
increases in the prices of oil, gas, and electricity. This action pro- 
voked opposition from elected politicians and demonstrations similar 
to those of 1973 by students and workers. As opposition grew, 
Kriangsak resigned. In March 1980, General Prem Tinsulanonda, 
who had been army commander in chief and defense minister, 
became prime minister with the support of younger officers of the 
armed forces and civilian political leaders. 

Prem in Power 

Although a military figure, Thailand's new prime minister sought 
to give civilians a greater role in government and promote more 



49 



Thailand: A Country Study 



stable and democratic political institutions. He enlisted the sup- 
port of the Democrat Party and the Social Action Party in the House 
of Representatives and, in contrast to Kriangsak, appointed mostly 
civilians to his cabinet. He benefited immensely from the support 
given him by the royal family, as was especially evident in April 
1981 when "Young Turk" officers launched a coup attempt in the 
capital region. These officers established a "Revolutionary Coun- 
cil," disbanded the National Assembly, and promised sweeping 
social changes, including land reform. Prem rushed to Khorat, 
where the royal family was in residence. When it became clear to 
regional military commanders that Prem enjoyed the king's back- 
ing in the present crisis, they offered him their support. On April 3, 
1981, loyalist military units secured Bangkok and rounded up the 
rebellious officers with minimal fighting and casualties. 

The monarch's role in politics was low key, but still pivotal. He 
had played a major part in the 1973 transition from military dic- 
tatorship to democracy. During the 1973-76 period, however, the 
king became increasingly apprehensive about the kinds of changes 
that were emerging because of a more liberalized political system. 
Communism seemed a genuine threat not only to political stabil- 
ity but also to the continuity of the royal family. This danger ex- 
plains the king's support for extremist groups such as the Village 
Scouts, his controversial decision to visit ex-strongman Thanom 
in a Buddhist monastery on the eve of the October 1976 violence, 
and his backing of Thanin's repressive anticommunist regime. 
Bhumibol's support of Prem after 1980, however, suggests that 
although his basically conservative perspective was unchanged, the 
king was also concerned with promoting the development of sta- 
ble parliamentary institutions in which the military would have a 
limited, and institutionalized, role. 

Prem, however, faced serious problems. A major figure in the 
suppression of the April 1981 coup attempt was General Arthit 
Kamlangek, deputy commander of the Second Army Region. After 
Bangkok was retaken, Arthit was rewarded for his loyalty with the 
post of commander of the First Army Region, which encompassed 
the capital. In October 1982, he was appointed army commander 
in chief. Arthit thus seemed poised to succeed, or push aside, Prem 
as Thailand's prime minister. Prem's government had been severely 
weakened by the coup attempt and by continual dissension among 
the civilian members of the government. Moreover, economic 
problems focused popular dissatisfaction on Prem in both urban 
and rural areas. Students became politically more active, though 
the leftist extremism of the 1973-76 period was not evident. Stu- 
dents and workers combined forces to protest an increase in bus 



50 



Historical Setting 



fares in 1982, obliging the government to rescind the increase. 
Demonstrations by farmers to raise the price of rice also occurred 
during this year with the backing of civilian politicians. 

By early 1983, however, Prem had the distinction of being the 
longest serving prime minister since the fall of Thanom in 1973. 
Although the military had remained the most powerful political 
force in the early 1980s, civilian political institutions had shown 
surprising vitality. One reason for their strength was that the 
political parties had some success in mobilizing popular support 
behind economic and social issues. On a more basic level, there 
was evidence that the population, especially in the urban areas, 
had grown tired of military strongmen and wanted stable and more 
open political institutions. 

Elections were scheduled for April 1983. A major obstacle to be 
overcome before the polling, however, was resolution of the heated 
dispute over "transitory" clauses in the 1978 Constitution. These 
clauses, which had ensured military control over the political sys- 
tem, were to become inoperative on April 21, 1983. Unless a con- 
stitutional amendment was passed to sustain the clauses, the 
appointed upper house, the Senate, would no longer be able to sit 
in joint session with the lower house and thus would lose a sub- 
stantial measure of power. Also, government officials, including 
military officers, would no longer be allowed to serve in the cabi- 
net. Finally, the structure of election constituencies would be rad- 
ically altered. Small, single-member constituencies would be 
replaced by large constituencies covering entire provinces. The first 
two changes were naturally unpopular with the military elite, while 
the third alienated the members of the smaller political parties, who 
believed the creation of "winner take all" province-level consti- 
tuencies would deprive them of parliamentary representation. 

These groups supported constitutional amendments to make the 
transitory clauses permanent and preserve the conservative aspects 
of the 1978 Constitution. The amendment proposals, however, were 
narrowly defeated when the Chart Thai voted against them in the 
legislature (see The Central Government, ch. 4). Prem deftly engi- 
neered a compromise by declaring that elections would be held 
before the transitory clauses (and the small constituency system) 
expired on April 21. The April 18 balloting, however, resulted in 
gains for the major parties. A coalition of the Social Action Party, 
Democrat Party, and National Democracy (Chart Prachathipatai) 
Party was stitched together and had a small majority in the lower 
house (the Chart Thai was excluded from the government because 
it lacked military backing). As a result of his continued military 



51 



Thailand: A Country Study 

backing and image as a leader above party politics, Prem was reap- 
pointed prime minister. 

Foreign Relations, 1977-83 

Beginning in 1977, the Thai government under Prime Minister 
Kriangsak had sought a rapprochement with Indochina's new com- 
munist states. Trade agreements and a transit accord were signed 
with Laos in 1978. In September of that year, Pham Van Dong, 
premier of Vietnam, visited Bangkok and gave assurances that his 
government w^uld not support a communist insurgency within 
Thailand. Troubles on the Thai-Cambodian border, including as- 
saults on Thai border villages by Cambodian forces, however, con- 
tinued to disrupt relations with Democratic Kampuchea. 

Vietnam's invasion of Democratic Kampuchea in December 
1978 initiated a new crisis. Vietnamese forces captured Phnom Penh 
in January 1979 and proclaimed the People's Republic of 
Kampuchea — a virtual satellite of Vietnam — a few days later. This 
action altered Cambodia's position as a buffer between Thailand 
and Vietnam. Thai and Vietnamese forces now faced each other 
over a common border, and there were repeated Vietnamese in- 
cursions into Thai territory (see State of National Security, ch. 5). 
Moreover, a flood of refugees from Cambodia placed great strains 
on Thai resources despite the donation of emergency aid by out- 
side nations (see The Indochinese Refugee Question, ch. 2). 

As a frontline state in the Cambodian crisis, Thailand joined 
the other members of ASEAN, the United States, and China in 
demanding a Vietnamese withdrawal from Cambodia. In June 
1982, the Thai government extended support to the anti- 
Vietnamese coalition formed by Prince Norodom Sihanouk, the 
Khmer Rouge's Khieu Samphan, and noncommunist Cambodian 
leader Son Sann. One unforeseen benefit of the Cambodian crisis 
was greatly improved relations between Thailand and China, as 
both countries found themselves in confrontation with Vietnam. 
By 1983 China had drastically reduced aid and support for the Thai 
and other Southeast Asian communist insurgencies as part of its 
new policy of improved relations within the region (see Foreign 
Affairs, ch. 4). 

David K. Wyatt's Thailand: A Short History is the best general 
survey in English and covers the history of the country from the 
earliest recorded appearance of the Tai peoples to events in the 
early 1980s. D.G.E. Hall's classic^ History of South- East Asia presents 



52 



Historical Setting 



a well-written general survey within the regional context, ending 
in the 1950s. On the earlier phases of Thai history, Georges 
Coedes's The Making of South East Asia is most helpful. In Thailand: 
Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State, Charles F. Keyes presents 
a general historical survey within the context of the Thai social and 
cultural setting. John L. S. Girling' s Thailand: Society and Politics 
provides an interesting interpretation of recent political, social, and 
economic developments. Periodicals such as the Journal of Asian 
Studies, Pacific Affairs, and the Journal of Southeast Asian Studies pub- 
lish articles of historical interest, and Asian Survey and the Far Eastern 
Economic Review Asia Year Book provide good accounts of contem- 
porary events. (For further information and complete citations, see 
Bibliography.) 



53 



Chapter 2. The Society and Its Environment 




Ayutthayan-style bronze Buddha in royal attire, Pencamapabitra (Monastery 
of the Fifth King), Bangkok 



NEITHER A STATIC nor a revolutionary society, Thailand has 
always been able to harness the talents of its people, make effec- 
tive use of its natural environment, and progress at an evolution- 
ary pace. The tendency of the Central Thai — for centuries the 
controlling group in Thai society — to eliminate or suppress ethnic 
or religious differences was tempered by the Chakkri Dynasty, 
which had, for the most part, fostered toleration since assuming 
the monarchy in 1782. 

Although Thai society appeared homogeneous, it actually 
represented a compromise among various groups, which, in order 
to preserve their own identity, accepted certain aspects of general 
Thai identity, or Ekkalak Thai. As in the past, in modern Thailand 
the basic social and communal structure was controlled by a power 
elite system comprising the monarchy, the military, and upper level 
bureaucrats. These groups had a symbiotic relationship with the 
economic and business community that strongly influenced deci- 
sion making. As a result of modern education and international 
influences, however, the composition of all parts of the elite sys- 
tem was changing in the late 1980s. 

As Thailand became more active in world trade and the inter- 
national community in general, the traditional practice of measuring 
status by the extent of landholdings became less meaningful. 
Although the Buddhist sangha (monastic community) and the royal 
family remained the largest landholders, they were no longer the 
richest elements in society. Their wealth was often surpassed by 
that of members of the business community and the bureaucracy 
(including the military), who derived their growing affluence from 
diverse sources. 

Commerce and other economic endeavors had always had a place 
in Thai society, but it was only in the late twentieth century that 
income derived by means other than landholding became socially 
acceptable. In modern Thailand, entrepreneurs, educated civil ser- 
vants, and career military officers were all accepted into the elite 
ranks. This expansion of the ruling elite was reflected in the grow- 
ing influence of elected members of the National Assembly. More 
kinds of people had the opportunity to participate in the shaping 
of Thai society after 1973; however, the gap continued to widen 
between rich and poor. 

As it made the transition from less developed country to indus- 
trialized state, Thailand often was cited as one of the success stories 



57 



Thailand: A Country Study 



of the Third World. Although Thailand benefited from modern- 
ization, being a rapidly developing nation was not without problems 
and costs. One problem related to increased urbanization and a 
growing market economy was the heightened desire for more con- 
sumer products at the expense of locally made goods, services, and 
recreational activities. The growing incidence of violent crime, 
divorce, prostitution, and drug addiction also could be attributed 
in part to increased urbanization. Modernization was also chang- 
ing the traditional ways by which individual Thai improved their 
economic and social condition. A university education, for exam- 
ple, used to virtually guarantee financial betterment; by the late 
1980s, however, large numbers of liberal arts graduates were either 
unemployed or underemployed. Modernization also hurt the rural 
Thai. Previously, their access to housing, forests, and usable water 
sources had been a given. By the 1980s, however, environmental 
destruction and a growing scarcity of arable land made it increas- 
ingly difficult for the rural Thai to be relatively independent of the 
government. 

Another cost of modernization was loss of security by some, 
including the elderly and Thailand's Buddhist monks, who previ- 
ously had had an assured place in Thai society. Care of and respect 
for the elderly had once been the responsibility of the immediate 
or extended family, but by the 1980s Thailand was beginning to 
build public and private senior citizen centers. Before World War 
II, the local monks and the sangha had been the main source of 
advice and information; in the 1980s, civil servants were often better 
equipped to attend to the needs of the people in an increasingly 
urban society. 

One of the greatest changes in society following World War II 
was the emergence of a middle group that included affluent 
bureaucrats, medium-scale entrepreneurs, educated professionals, 
and small shopkeepers. The lower class included steadily employed 
wage workers and unskilled laborers who worked intermittently, 
if at all. Those in the middle and lower groups had not tradition- 
ally constituted self-conscious classes; those categories were rela- 
tively new and just beginning to develop common interests. Labor 
unions, for example, hopelessly divided over political differences 
in the past, made active attempts to unite on a number of issues, 
such as basic health and social benefits, in their negotiations with 
the government and the private sector. 

The peasants still comprised the majority of the population. They 
were, however, much more differentiated than in the past. The 
peasantry could be defined in terms of its desire for or ownership 
of land or other agricultural resources, such as teak forests. The 



58 



Busy street scene in Bangkok 
Courtesy United Nations 



issue of landlessness in the central plain arose in the early twen- 
tieth century but was soon resolved by the opening of previously 
untilled areas in the northern part of the country. As a result of 
rapid population growth in the 1960s and 1970s, international com- 
petition in a number of Thailand's traditional agro-economic indus- 
tries, and migration to the city, landlessness was again on the rise 
in the 1980s. The number of rural Thai remained large and con- 
tinued to increase. As Thailand's economy continued to grow in 
the service areas of banking and tourism, more young adults were 
attracted to city jobs, thus reducing the ability of families to con- 
tinue labor-intensive rice farming. At the same time, land increased 
in value, and absentee landlords bought up small family farms 
because there were no legally enforceable limits on the amount of 
land that could be acquired. 

Cutting across rural and national strata was the system of patron- 
client relationships that tied specific households or individuals 
together as long as both patron and client saw benefits in the 
arrangement. In many respects, the dynamics of political and eco- 
nomic life were comprehensible only in terms of patron-client 
relations. 

Another traditional system of complex values and behaviors that 
the majority of Thai shared through the 1980s was Theravada 
Buddhism. Complementing the religion were beliefs and practices 



59 



Thailand: A Country Study 

assuming the existence of several types of spirits (phi — see Glos- 
sary) whose behavior was supposed to affect human welfare. The 
Buddhism of the Thai villagers, and even of poorly educated monks, 
often differed substantially from the canonical religion. 

Physical Setting 

Thailand's 514,000 square kilometers lie in the middle of main- 
land Southeast Asia. The nation's axial position influenced many 
aspects of Thailand's society and culture. The earliest speakers of 
the Tai (see Glossary) language migrated from what is now China, 
following rivers into northern Thailand and southward to the Mae 
Nam (river) Chao Phraya Valley. The fertile floodplain and trop- 
ical monsoon climate, ideally suited to wet-rice (thamna) cultiva- 
tion, attracted settlers to this central area rather than to the marginal 
uplands and mountains of the northern region or the Khorat Plateau 
to the northeast. By the twelfth century, a number of loosely con- 
nected rice-growing and trading states flourished in the upper Chao 
Phraya Valley. Starting in the middle of the fourteenth century, 
these central chiefdoms gradually came under the control of the 
kingdom of Ayutthaya at the southern extremity of the floodplain. 
Successive capitals, built at various points along the river, became 
centers of great Thai kingdoms based on rice cultivation and for- 
eign commerce. Unlike the neighboring Khmer and Burmese, the 
Thai continued to look outward across the Gulf of Thailand and 
the Andaman Sea toward foreign ports of trade. When European 
imperialism brought a new phase in Southeast Asian commerce 
in the late 1800s, Thailand (known then as Siam — see Glossary) 
was able to maintain its independence as a buffer zone between 
British-controlled Burma to the west and French-dominated 
Indochina to the east (see The Bangkok Period, 1767-1932, ch. 1). 

Boundaries 

Thailand in the late 1980s shared boundaries with Burma, 
Malaysia, Laos, and Cambodia. Although neither China nor 
Vietnam bordered Thailand, the territory of both countries came 
within 100 kilometers of Thai territory (see fig. 2). Many parts 
of Thailand's boundaries followed natural features, such as the 
Mekong River. Most borders had been stabilized and demarcated 
in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in accordance 
with treaties forced on Thailand and its neighbors by Britain and 
France. In some areas, however, exact boundaries, especially along 
Thailand's eastern borders with Laos and Cambodia, were still in 
dispute in the late 1980s. 



60 



The Society and Its Environment 



Disputes with Cambodia after 1950 arose in part from ill-defined 
boundaries; the most notable case was a dispute over the Preah 
Vihear Temple area submitted to the International Court of Justice, 
which ruled in favor of Cambodia in 1962. During the years that 
the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, was controlled by the Khmer 
Rouge regime of Pol Pot (1975-79), the border disputes continued. 
In the early 1980s, the People's Republic of Kampuchea and its 
mentor, Vietnam, made an issue of boundaries in Prachin Buri 
Province in eastern Thailand. In contrast to these incidents, which 
attracted international attention, boundary disputes with Malay- 
sia and Burma were usually handled more cooperatively. Continu- 
ing mineral exploration and fishing in the Gulf of Thailand, 
however, were sources of potential conflict with both neighbors. 
Adding to general border tensions were the activities of communist- 
led insurgents, whose operations had been of paramount concern 
to the Thai government and its security forces for several decades. 
The problem of communist insurgency was compounded by the 
activity of what the Thai government labeled "antistate elements." 
Often the real source of border problems was ordinary criminals 
or local merchants involved in illegal mining, logging, smuggling, 
and narcotics production and trade (see State of National Secu- 
rity, ch. 5). 

Topography and Drainage 

The most conspicuous features of Thailand's terrain are high 
mountains, a central plain, and an upland plateau (see fig. 7). 
Mountains cover much of northern Thailand and extend along 
the Burmese border down through the Malay Peninsula. The 
central plain is a lowland area drained by the Chao Phraya and 
its tributaries, the country's principal river system, which feeds 
into the delta at the head of the Bight of Bangkok. The Chao 
Phraya system drains about one-third of the nation's territory. In 
the northeastern part of the country the Khorat Plateau, a region 
of gently rolling low hills and shallow lakes, drains into the 
Mekong River through the Mae Nam Mun. The Mekong system 
empties into the South China Sea and includes a series of canals 
and dams. 

Together, the Chao Phraya and Mekong systems sustain 
Thailand's agricultural economy by supporting wet-rice cultiva- 
tion and providing waterways for the transport of goods and peo- 
ple. In contrast, the distinguishing natural features of peninsular 
Thailand are long coasdines, offshore islands, and diminishing man- 
grove swamps. 



61 



Thailand: A Country Study 
Regions 

Landforms and drainage divide the country more or less into 
four natural regions — the North, the Northeast, the Center, and 
the South. Although Bangkok geographically is part of the central 
plain, as the capital and largest city this metropolitan area may 
be considered in other respects a separate region. Each of the four 
geographical regions differs from the others in population, basic 
resources, natural features, and level of social and economic de- 
velopment. The diversity of the regions is in fact the most 
pronounced attribute of Thailand's physical setting. 

During the winter months, in the mountainous North the tem- 
perature is cool enough for the cultivation of fruits such as lychees 
and strawberries. These high mountains are incised by steep river 
valleys and upland areas that border the central plain. A series of 
rivers, including the Nan, Ping, Wang, and Yom, unite in the 
lowlands to form the Chao Phraya watershed. Traditionally, these 
natural features made possible several different types of agricul- 
ture, including wet-rice farming in the valleys and shifting culti- 
vation (see Glossary) in the uplands. The forested mountains also 
promoted a spirit of regional independence. Forests, including 
stands of teak and other economically useful hardwoods that once 
dominated the North and parts of the Northeast, had diminished 
by the 1980s to 13 million hectares. In 1961 they covered 56 per- 
cent of the country, but by the mid-1980s forestland had been 
reduced to less than 30 percent of Thailand's total area. 

The Northeast, with its poor soils, is not favored agriculturally. 
The region consists mainly of the dry Khorat Plateau and a few 
low hills. The short monsoon season brings heavy flooding in the 
river valleys. Unlike the more fertile areas of Thailand, the North- 
east has a long dry season, and much of the land is covered by 
sparse grasses. Mountains ring the plateau on the west and the 
south, and the Mekong delineates much of the eastern rim. 

The "heartland" of the Central Thai, the Center is a natural 
self-contained basin often termed "the rice bowl of Asia." The com- 
plex irrigation system developed for wet-rice agriculture in this 
region provided the necessary economic support to sustain the de- 
velopment of the Thai state from the thirteenth-century kingdom 
of Sukhothai to contemporary Bangkok. Here the rather flat un- 
changing landscape facilitated inland water and road transport. The 
fertile area was able to sustain a dense population, 422 persons per 
square kilometer in 1987, compared with an average of 98 for the 
country as a whole. The terrain of the region is dominated by the 
Chao Phraya and its tributaries and by the cultivated paddy fields. 



62 




Figure 7. Topography and Drainage 



64 



The Society and Its Environment 



Metropolitan Bangkok, the focal point of trade, transport, and 
industrial activity, is situated on the southern edge of the region 
at the head of the Gulf of Thailand and includes part of the delta 
of the Chao Phraya system. 

The South, a narrow peninsula, is distinctive in climate, ter- 
rain, and resources. Its economy is based on rice cultivation for 
subsistence and rubber production for industry. Other sources of 
income include coconut plantations, tin mining, and tourism, which 
is particularly lucrative on Phuket Island. Rolling and mountainous 
terrain and the absence of large rivers are conspicuous features 
of the South. North- south mountain barriers and impenetrable trop- 
ical forest caused the early isolation and separate political develop- 
ment of this region. International access through the Andaman Sea 
and the Gulf of Thailand made the South a crossroads for both 
Theravada Buddhism, centered at Nakhon Si Thammarat, and 
Islam, especially in the former sultanate of Pattani on the border 
with Malaysia. 

Thailand's regions are further divided into a total of seventy- 
three provinces (see fig. 8). The country's provinces have the same 
names as their respective capitals. 

Climate 

Thailand has a tropical monsoon climate; temperatures normally 
range from an average annual high of 38°C to a low of 19°C . South- 
west monsoons that arrive between May and July (except in the 
South) signal the advent of the rainy season (ridufon), which lasts 
into October. November and December mark the onset of the dry 
season. Temperatures begin to climb in January, and a hot sun 
parches the landscape. The dry season is shortest in the South be- 
cause of the proximity of the sea to all parts of the Malay Penin- 
sula. With only minor exceptions, every area of the country receives 
adequate rainfall, but the duration of the rainy season and the 
amount of rain vary substantially from region to region and with 
altitude. The Northeast experiences a long dry season, and its red, 
porous (laterite) soils retain water poorly, which limits their agricul- 
tural potential. 

Population 

Since 1911 Thailand has taken frequent national censuses, and 
its National Statistical Office, working closely with a number of 
international agencies, was in the 1980s one of the most extensive 
sources of statistical information in Asia. One of the 20 most 
populous nations in the world, Thailand had in 1987 about 53 mil- 
lion people. This total was divided about equally between males 



65 



The Society and Its Environment 



and females. The regional breakdown was approximately 16.7 mil- 
lion in the Center (which included the Bangkok metropolitan area), 
17.8 million in the Northeast, 11.3 million in the North, and 6.8 
million in the South. As in most Southeast Asian nations, the popu- 
lation was youthful and agrarian; approximately 37 percent of the 
population was between the ages of 15 and 29. In the decades after 
World War II, however, the percentage of agricultural population 
declined; it decreased from 79.3 percent to 72.3 percent of the popu- 
lation between 1970 and 1980, for example. 

The shrinking of the rural population resulted in part from in- 
ternal migration to the capital and provincial centers. In 1987 about 
10 percent of the population lived in Bangkok, which had 3,292 
persons per square kilometer. The 9 largest cities after Bangkok 
ranged in population from 80,000 to 110,000. They were Khon 
Kaen, Hat Yai, Chiang Mai, Ubon Ratchathani, Nakhon Sawan, 
Nakhon Ratchasima, Krabi, Udon Thani, and Songkhla (see 
fig. 9). 

Bangkok, with 1,537 square kilometers, represented the com- 
bining of the royal capital of the Chakkri Dynasty with Thon Buri, 
the capital of King Taksin (see The Bangkok Period, 1767-1932, 
ch. 1). In the late 1980s, this urban area was made up of 24 dis- 
tricts (khet), with a combined population of 5.5 million. In spite 
of massive construction and changes in the economy, many of the 
districts retained their unique identities. For example, Dusit Dis- 
trict, where the royal family had its principal residence, was also 
home to many of the city's military officers and civil servants. 

Rapid urbanization in the 1980s was changing not only where 
the Thai lived but also how they lived. Separate private houses were 
located in high-density areas or out in new sprawling suburbs. The 
Thai were also moving into townhouses and condominiums; by 
1984 sixty-nine residential condominium communities had been 
built or were in the final phase of construction. A family compound 
along a tree- shaded khlong (canal) was a rare sight. Although fer- 
ries continued to ply the Chao Phraya, the boat was no longer the 
main mode of transportation. Bangkok had about 900,000 registered 
motor vehicles and a new superhighway system partially completed 
in the late 1980s; massive traffic jams, noise, and air pollution had 
become part of everyday life. Most of the canals in the "Venice 
of the East" had been replaced with roads; this replacement was 
in part causing the city to sink. Annual flooding in the city and 
growing slums such as Khlong Toei often made city services rather 
than politics the key issue in metropolitan elections. Bangkok had 
10 percent of the national population, but the capital required a 



67 



Provinces of Thailand 


Ang Thong (40) 


Phetchabun (21) 


Buriram (35) 


Phetchaburi (49) 


Chachoengsao (55) 


Phichit (20) 


Chainat(31) 


Philsanulok (13) 


Chaiyaphum (22) 


Phra Nakhon 


Chanthaburi (57) 


Si Ayutlhaya (41) 


Chiang Mai (2) 


Phrae (8) 


Chiang Rai (3) 


Phuket (64) 


Chon Buri (54) 


Prachin Buri (48) 


Chumphon (60) 


Prachuap 


Kalasin (25) 


Khiri Khan (59) 


Kamphaeng Phet (12) 


Ranong (61) 


Kanchanaburi (38) 


Ralchaburi (43) 


Khon Kaen (23) 


Rayong (56) 


Krabi (65) 


Roi El (26) 


Krung Thep 


Sakon Nakhon (17) 


Mahanakhon (52) 


Samut Prakan (53) 


Lampang (7) 


Samut Sakhon (51) 


Lamphun (6) 


Samut Songkhram (50) 


Loei (14) 


Sara Buri (42) 


Lop Buri (33) 


Satun (69) 


Mae Hong Son (1) 


Sing Buri (32) 


Maha Sarakham (24) 


Sisaket (37) 


Mukdahan (27) 


Songkhla (70) 


Nakhon Nayok (47) 


Sukhothai (10) 


Nakhon Pathom (44) 


Suphan Buri (39) 


Nakhon Phanom (18) 


Sural Thani (63) 


Nakhon Ralchasima (34) 


Surin (36) 


Nakhon Sawan (19) 


Tak (9) 


Nakhon Si Thammarat (66, 


Trang (67) 


Nan (5) 


77a t (58) 


Naralhiwat (73) 


Ubon Ratchathani (29) 


Nong Khai (16) 


Udon Thani (15) 


Nonlhaburi (45) 


Uthai Thani (30) 


Pathum Thani (46) 


Ultaradil (11) 


Patlani (71) 


Yala (72) 


Phangnga (62) 


Yasoihon (28) 


Phatlhalung (68) 




Phayao (4) Province 


have the same names 




°spective capitals. 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 8. Regions and Provinces, 1987 



66 



Thailand: A Country Study 




The Society and Its Environment 



disproportionate percentage of the national budget to maintain basic 
city services. 

Thailand's rush both to develop and to satisfy the demand for 
consumer products had several side effects, including dwindling 
agricultural land, the destruction of forests, and damage to water- 
sheds. These consequences prompted the central government, with 
support from international agencies, to make a concerted effort to 
limit population growth. In 1968 the cabinet sanctioned a family- 
planning service, and by March 1970 a national population policy 
was announced. The official slogan "Many Children Make You 
Poor" and the economic arguments for keeping the number of chil- 
dren at two per family found acceptance among both city and rural 
populations. Successful programs were undertaken by the Planned 
Parenthood Association of Thailand and the Family Planning Ser- 
vices. By 1974 an estimated 25 percent of all married couples of 
childbearing age were using modern contraceptives, one of the 
highest percentages for developing countries. The population growth 
rate, 3.4 percent per annum in the 1960s, had been reduced to 
1.9 percent per annum by 1986. The goal for the late 1980s was 
a growth rate of 1.5 percent (see table 3, Appendix). 

Ethnicity, Regionalism, and Language 

Although the population was relatively homogeneous in the 
1980s — an estimated 85 percent or more spoke a language of the 
Tai family and shared other cultural features, such as adherence 
to Theravada Buddhism — regionalism and ethnic differences were 
socially and politically significant. Moreover, these differences 
affected the access of specific groups and regions to economic and 
other resources, which in turn heightened ethnic or regional con- 
sciousness. 

Perhaps the principal fact of regional and ethnic relations was 
the social, linguistic, and political dominance of the Central Thai, 
who were descendants of the subjects of the premodern kingdoms 
of the Chao Phraya floodplain. The Central Thai were defined as 
those who considered central Thailand their birthplace or the Cen- 
tral Thai (Standard Thai) dialect their first language. With the 
advent of increased migration, modern communication, and edu- 
cation, however, it was becoming increasingly difficult to use lan- 
guage to determine place of origin. 

The Central Thai constituted but one of the regionally defined 
categories that made up the majority of Thai — the core Thai. The 
number of persons belonging to groups other than the core Thai 
was difficult to specify precisely, whether membership in those 
groups was defined by language, by other features of culture, or 



69 



Thailand: A Country Study 

by an individual's self-identification. Part of the problem was the 
Thai government's policy of promoting assimilation but not 
encouraging the active collection of data on Thai ethnicity. Govern- 
ment statistics on aliens, tribal minorities, and refugees were more 
readily available, although sometimes disputed by both scholars 
and the groups in question. 

Despite the inadequacy of the data, it was possible to make some 
rough estimates of the ethnic composition of the minority sector 
of the Thai population in 1987. Among the largest minority groups, 
Chinese constituted about 11 percent of the population, Malay 
about 3 percent, and long-term resident (as opposed to refugee) 
Khmer less than 1 percent. The remaining minority groups ranged 
in number from a few hundred to more than 100,000. Of these, 
the largest group was the Karen, estimated at about 250,000 in 
the 1980s. Some of the minority groups spoke languages of the Tai 
family but differed in several ways from the core Thai. 

The Thai and Other Tai-Speaking Peoples 

The core Thai — the Central Thai, the Northeastern Thai (Thai- 
Lao), the Northern Thai, and the Southern Thai — spoke dialects 
of one of the languages of the Tai language family. The peoples 
who spoke those languages — generically also referred to as Tai — 
originated in southern China, but they were dispersed throughout 
mainland Southeast Asia from Burma to Vietnam (see Early His- 
tory, ch. 1). It was conventional in the 1980s to refer to Tai-speaking 
peoples in Thailand as Thai (same pronunciation) with a regional 
or other qualifier, e.g., Central Thai. There were, however, groups 
in Thailand in the late twentieth century who spoke a language 
of the Tai family but who were not part of the core population. 

Although the four major Tai-speaking groups taken together 
clearly constituted the overwhelming majority of Thailand's popu- 
lation, it was not entirely clear what proportion of the core Thai 
fell into each of the regional categories. Among the reasons for the 
uncertainty were the movements of many who were not Central 
Thai in origin into the Bangkok area and its environs and the move- 
ment of Central Thai, perhaps in smaller numbers, into other 
regions as administrators, educators, technicians, bureaucrats, sol- 
diers, and sometimes as settlers. The Central Thai, of generally 
higher status than the general populace, tended to retain their iden- 
tities wherever they lived, whereas those from other regions migrat- 
ing to the central plain might seek to take on Central Thai speech, 
customs, and identity. 

Although politically, socially, and culturally dominant, the Cen- 
tral Thai did not constitute a majority of the population and barely 



70 



The Society and Its Environment 



exceeded the Thai-Lao in numbers, according to a mid-1960s esti- 
mate. At that time, the Central Thai made up roughly 32 percent 
of the population, with the Thai-Lao a close second at about 30 
percent. The Thai-Lao were essentially the same ethnic group that 
constituted the dominant population of Laos, although they far out- 
numbered the population of that country (see Ethnic and Regional 
Relations, this ch.). 

A number of linguistic scholars mark the reign of King Narai 
(1657-88) as the point when the Central Thai (or Ayutthaya Thai) 
dialect was established as the standard to which other forms or 
dialects were compared. Central Thai was the required form used 
in modern Thailand for official, business, academic, and other daily 
transactions. From Ayutthayan times, Central Thai borrowed 
words from Khmer, Pali, and Sanskrit. Thailand still maintained 
a court language called Phasa Ratchasap, although King Bhumibol 
Adulyadej (Rama IX, 1946-) encouraged the use of Central Thai. 
Similarly, Pali, the religious language, although still used, gradu- 
ally was being replaced by Central Thai for many ceremonies and 
writings. Although the Thai Royal Academy was the final arbiter 
of new words added to the language, post-World War II Thai has 
been influenced heavily by American English, especially in the area 
of science and technology. 

Increasingly, Central Thai was spoken with varied fluency all 
over the country as the education system reached larger numbers 
of children (see Education and the Arts, this ch.). Nevertheless, 
regional dialects (or their local variants) remained the language 
of the home and of the local community. Learning Central Thai 
is not a simple matter. The dialects of the four regional compo- 
nents of the core population are only mutually intelligible with 
difficulty. There are lexical and syntactic differences as well as differ- 
ences in pronunciation. 

Differences in dialect were sometimes an irritant in relations be- 
tween those whose native tongue was Central Thai and persons 
from other regions. On the one hand, if persons migrating from 
other regions to Bangkok spoke their own dialect, they might be 
treated with contempt by the Central Thai. If, on the other hand, 
such persons failed to speak Central Thai with sufficient fluency 
and a proper accent, that, too, could lead to their being treated 
disrespectfully. 

Generally, before the trend toward homogenization of dress, lan- 
guage, and forms of entertainment fostered by modern communi- 
cation, there were regional differences in costume, folklore, and 
other aspects of culture among the Thai people. The continuing 
retention of these differences into the 1980s seemed to be a function 



71 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of relative remoteness from Bangkok and other urban areas. Of 
some importance, according to observers, was the tendency to cling 
to, and even accentuate, these regional differences as symbols of 
a sense of grievance. 

In the past, some Thai governments put great pressure on the 
various Thai peoples to forsake regional customs and dialects for 
"modern" Central Thai culture. In the 1980s, however, there was 
a rebirth of the study and teaching of local languages, especially 
Lanna Thai in the North and also the Southern Thai dialect. Efforts 
were also made to expose all Thai to the different cultures and tra- 
ditions of the various regions through regional translation and art 
programs. At the same time, Central Thai became more readily 
accepted as a second language. The success of the national iden- 
tity programs could be explained in part by the Thai literacy rate, 
one of the highest in Asia. 

The Tai-speaking peoples of the Northeast, known as Thai-Lao 
or Isan, live on the Khorat Plateau. Once the weakest in Thailand, 
the Northeast's economy started to improve somewhat in the 1970s 
because of irrigation and energy projects, such as the construction 
of the Khuan Ubon Ratana (Nam Phong Dam). Moreover, be- 
cause the Northeast was the location of several United States mili- 
tary bases during the Second Indochina War (1954-75), the region 
had one of the best transportation systems in Asia, which facili- 
tated internal migration as well as communication with Bangkok. 
Historically, this area relied heavily on border trade with Laos and 
Cambodia; in 1987 the Thai government permitted increased Lao- 
tian border commerce and lifted a ban on the export of all but 61 
of 273 "strategic" items previously barred from leaving Thailand. 
Also, traditional handicrafts, e.g., silk weavings and mats, increas- 
ingly were being sold outside the region to produce extra income. 
Still, approximately 82 percent of the region's labor force was 
involved in agriculture. 

In terms of language and culture, both the Northeastern Thai 
and the Northern Thai were closer to the peoples of Laos than to 
the Central Thai. Speakers of the Tai language of Kham Mu'ang 
(known as Yuan in its written form) made up the majority of the 
population of the 9 northernmost provinces from the Burmese-Lao 
border down through the province of Uttaradit, an area of about 
102,000 square kilometers. Highly independent, the Northern Thai 
lived mainly in small river valleys where they grew glutinous rice 
as their staple food. The Chakkri Dynasty continued to maintain 
a court in Chiang Mai, the largest city of the North, which the 
Thai people looked to as a major religious and cultural center. 



72 



Lisu tribespeople in northern Thailand 
Courtesy United Nations 



The fourteen provinces of the South made up the poorest region 
of Thailand. Primarily rural, the South had an urban population 
of only 12.2 percent of its total inhabitants. Although rice was the 
staple food, the South' s economy was not based on wet-rice agricul- 
ture. Never directly colonized, the southern provinces, with their 
dependence on rubber and tin production and fishing, had nonethe- 
less long been vulnerable to international economic forces. As world 
market prices for rubber and tin declined in the 1970s, more 
southerners went to work in the Middle East; and as neighboring 
countries established 200-mile limits on their territorial waters, an 
increasing number of Thai fishing vessels could be found as far 
away as the coast of Australia. 

In 1985 there were more than 6 million Southern Thai. Malay 
vocabulary was used in the Southern Thai dialect, and Malay in 
Jawi (Arabic) script remained in many instances the medium of 
written communication. Like the other regions of Thailand, the 
South at times opposed the central government. Following the closer 
incorporation of the Pattani region into the Thai kingdom as the 
result of the provincial administrative reform of 1902, reactions 
in the form of rebellions, underground movements, and violent 
uprisings were common. For many years, any type of antistate be- 
havior or banditry reported by the government or press was usually 
attributed either to Muslim insurgents or the Communist Party 



73 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of Thailand. By the mid-1980s, the press and government had 
become more objective in reporting and recognizing problems 
caused by environmental factors, other groups, and government 
policies. Moreover, the Muslim leadership, together with progres- 
sive political and military forces in the Thai government, had begun 
addressing some of the problems of the South, which led to increased 
national tranquillity. 

Of the more than 85 percent of the country's population that 
spoke a language of the Tai family, only a small fraction constituted 
the membership of the half-dozen or so ethnic groups outside the 
core Thai. These groups lived in the North or Northeast and were 
often closely related to ethnic groups in neighboring countries. In 
Thailand, the largest of these Tai-speaking minorities were the 
Phutai (or Phuthai) of the far Northeast, who numbered about 
100,000 in the mid-1960s. There were also many Phutai in neigh- 
boring Laos. The Phuan and the Saek, also in the Northeast and 
with kin in Laos, were similar but much smaller groups. Whereas 
all other Tai languages spoken in Thailand belonged to the south- 
western branch of the family, that spoken by the Saek belonged 
to the northern branch, suggesting a more recent arrival from 
China. The Khorat Thai were not considered Central Thai, despite 
their close resemblance in language and dress, because they and 
others tended to identify them as a separate group. The Khorat 
Thai were said to be descendants of Thai soldiers and Khmer 
women. The Shan (a Burmese term) in the North were part of a 
much larger group, the majority of whom lived in Burma, while 
others lived in China. Different groups of the Shan called them- 
selves by names in which the term Tai was modified by a word 
meaning "great" or something similar. The Thai called them Thai 
Ngio or Thai Yai. Also in the North were a people called the Lue, 
estimated in the mid-1960s to number less than 50,000. Like the 
Shan, they resided in greater numbers elsewhere, particularly in 
southern China. 

The Non-Tai Minorities 

Besides the Tai-speaking minorities, there were a number of peo- 
ples speaking languages of other families (although increasing num- 
bers were acquainted with a Thai dialect, especially Central Thai, 
if they acquired the language in school). Some — such as the Khmer 
in the eastern portion of the country, the Karen in the northern 
and western parts of Thailand, and the Malay in the South — found 
themselves within the boundaries of Thailand as a consequence 
of conflict and shifting borders. Others, such as many of the hill 
peoples, were relatively recent migrants from China and the 



74 



The Society and Its Environment 



Indochinese Peninsula. They found their way to the peripheries 
of Thailand either in search of land or to escape political turmoil. 
Groups entering Thailand that had been minorities in their coun- 
tries of origin, as hill peoples typically were, became more or less 
permanent residents of Thailand, although still largely unassimi- 
lated. Others, particularly the Mon, who lived in the central region, 
became substantially integrated. The groups of Vietnamese who 
had arrived for various reasons from the nineteenth through the 
mid-twentieth centuries varied in the extent to which they were 
rooted in Thailand. Some groups of Khmer, refugees from politi- 
cal turmoil in their own country since 1975, were also recent arrivals 
in Thailand. Finally, there were the Chinese. Of the estimated 6 
million in Thailand in 1987, most could be differentiated by the 
region of China from which they came, when they had arrived, 
and the extent to which they had been assimilated into Thai society. 

The Highland, or Hill, Peoples 

Commonly included among the highland people were the eth- 
nic groups living in the mountains of northern and northwestern 
Thailand in the area known, because of its illegal opium produc- 
tion, as the "Golden Triangle." Until the 1970s, the Thai central 
government tended to regard these groups chiefly as opium culti- 
vators engaged in illegal activities. Since that time the highland 
minorities, through their own efforts and government-organized 
crop substitution projects, have become involved in the legal mar- 
ket economy of the country. 

Among the larger groups of highland people were the Karen 
(Kariang, Yang), Hmong (Meo, Miao), Mien (Yao), Lahu 
(Mussur), Akha (Kaw), and Lisu, or Lisaw (see fig. 10). Some 
of the smaller groups preceded the Tai-speaking peoples in the area, 
but many were relative latecomers. Through natural increase and 
immigration, the population of the highlands increased from 
approximately 100,000 in 1948 to about 700,000 in the late 1980s, 
according to Ministry of Interior estimates. This population growth 
led to a significant increase in the number of landless people in 
the highlands. As a result, many of the landless began cultivating 
forest reserves, thereby accelerating the depletion of the country's 
forestland. 

The varying estimates for specific groups in some cases reflected 
the tendency of estimators to include only those still living in rela- 
tively isolated mountain communities, whereas other observers 
might include some or all of those who had come down from the 
mountains and were at various points in the process of becoming 
Thai. Observers noted that for some groups, more individuals were 



75 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 10. Distribution of Selected Ethno linguistic and Regional Groups 

76 



The Society and Its Environment 



in the process of assimilation than remained in the mountain com- 
munities that were their traditional homes. The languages spoken 
by the hill peoples fell into three broad categories: Tibeto-Burman 
(a subfamily of the larger Sino-Tibetan language family), Mon- 
Khmer (a subfamily of the Austro-Asiatic language family), and 
the small Miao-Yao language family. The language of the most 
numerous of these hill peoples, the Karen, was generally consid- 
ered Sino-Tibetan, but some authorities included it in the subset 
Tibeto-Burman, or placed it in a category of its own. The other 
languages included in the Tibeto-Burman category — Akha, Lisu, 
Lahu, and Jinghpaw (Kachin) — have been estimated as ranging 
from a few hundred speakers (Jinghpaw) to about 25,000 speak- 
ers (Akha). 

The category of Mon-Khmer included a number of highland 
groups: the Kui (called Soai by the Thai), which totaled between 
100,000 and 150,000 in the mid-1960s; the Tin, about 20,000; and 
several smaller groups, including the Lua (also called Lawa), about 
9,000; the Khmu, about 7,600; and the Chaobon, about 2,000. 
The Kui were said to be largely assimilated into Thai society. The 
figure for the Khmu pertained only to those presumably living in 
the highlands in a more or less traditional setting. Substantial num- 
bers were said to be pursuing a Thai way of life. 

The Miao-Yao languages were spoken by two peoples, the 
Hmong and Mien, both originally from China (the terms Miao and 
Yao are Chinese). There were Hmong and Mien still living in China 
as well as other Southeast Asian countries. Called Meo by the Thai, 
the Hmong began to arrive in Thailand in the late nineteenth cen- 
tury, and some continued to migrate directly from China or other 
neighboring states, particularly Laos. Numbering about 50,000 in 
1970, the Hmong were one of the largest groups of hill peoples. 
An additional 40,000 Hmong fled from Laos to Thailand in 1975, 
but by the late 1980s many of these had migrated elsewhere, some 
going to the United States. The Mien were even more recent 
arrivals, most of them having come from Laos after 1945. Their 
numbers were estimated at 30,000 in the 1980s. These two groups, 
particularly the Hmong, were among those affected by the secu- 
rity operations of the Thai government that began in the mid-1960s. 
These actions occurred in part because the Hmong, like other 
mountain groups, were said to be destroying forests in the course 
of practicing their traditional shifting cultivation, and in part 
because their chief cash crop was the opium poppy (see State of 
National Security, ch. 5). 



77 



Thailand: A Country Study 
The Khmer 

Two groups of Khmer could also be distinguished — long-time 
inhabitants of Thailand and more recent arrivals. By the mid- 
fifteenth century, much of the western region of the Khmer Em- 
pire had come under the control of Ayutthaya. Many of the Khmer 
peoples remained in the area that had come under Thai domina- 
tion. Five centuries later the protracted civil conflict in Cambo- 
dia, which began with the overthrow of the Lon Nol regime in 1975 
and included the Vietnam-supported overthrow of the Pol Pot re- 
gime in 1979, led to the arrival at the Thai-Cambodian border of 
additional hundreds of thousands of Khmer. Some Khmer had 
crossed over into Thailand; many others might be expected to do 
so if several political obstacles were overcome (see The Indochinese 
Refugee Question, this ch.; Potential External Threats, ch. 5). 

Theravada Buddhists and wet-rice cultivators, the Khmer spoke 
a language of the Mon-Khmer group and were heirs to a long and 
complex political and cultural tradition. If long-term resident 
Khmer and Khmer refugees were both included, there were perhaps 
as many as 600,000 to 800,000 Khmer living in Thailand in the 
1980s. Many of the long-resident Khmer were said to speak Thai, 
sometimes as a first language, and religious and other similarities 
contributed over time to Thai-Khmer intermarriage and to Khmer 
assimilation into Thai society. Newly arrived Khmer, however, 
were not yet assimilated. 

The Mon 

Perhaps the first Theravada Buddhists in Southeast Asia, and 
the founders in the seventh century of the kingdom of Haripun- 
jaya near present-day Chiang Mai, the Mon greatly influenced the 
development of Thai culture. Mon architecture dotted the North, 
where a number of temples were still inhabited by Mon monks in 
the 1980s. The Mon, also known as Raman or Tailaing, migrated 
from Burma during the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries. They were 
welcomed by the Chakkri rulers, and their religious discipline helped 
inspire the reforms made by King Mongkut (Rama IV, reigned 
1851-68). The Mon who settled chiefly in the North and the cen- 
tral plain, e.g., at Nonthaburi, Ayutthaya, Lop Buri, Uthai Thani, 
and Ratchaburi, generally were wet-rice farmers who also had 
specialized skills such as pottery-making. They maintained a 
social organization similar to that of the Thai and other lowland 
cultures. Their villages were governed by Mon headmen, who in 
turn were responsible to district and provincial officers of Mon 
ancestry. Although their language was related to Khmer, the Mon 



78 



The Society and Its Environment 



incorporated a large number of Thai words into their vocabulary. 
Moreover, language differences became less important as Mon chil- 
dren, educated in Thai schools, learned Central Thai. In the 1980s, 
some Mon still used their own language in certain contexts, but 
few did not know Thai. In general, the Mon were more integrated 
into Thai society than any other non-Thai group. 

The Vietnamese 

In the mid-1970s, the number of Vietnamese in Thailand was 
estimated at between 60,000 and 70,000, most of them in the North- 
east. Three broad categories of Vietnamese were in the country. 
The first were the descendants of persons who fled from political 
upheaval and persecution during the precolonial era in the late eigh- 
teenth century and through much of the nineteenth century. Most 
of them settled either in Bangkok or in the area southeast of it, 
and many of their descendants were absorbed into Thai society, 
although some still lived in villages that were identifiably Viet- 
namese. Many who came in the nineteenth century were refugees 
from anti-Catholic persecution by rulers in Cochinchina (southern 
Vietnam, around the Mekong Delta) before the French established 
political control over that area. The second category consisted of 
persons who opposed the establishment of French domination over 
all Vietnam in 1884 and presumably expected their stay in Thailand 
to be short. With some exceptions, however, their descendants and 
those of other Vietnamese who came to Thailand in the first de- 
cades of the twentieth century remained. The earliest arrivals in 
this category, like their predecessors, mostly came to southeast 
Thailand. Later immigrants tended to go to the Northeast. The 
third category included those who fled from Vietnam between the 
end of World War II in 1945 and the consolidation of North Viet- 
namese rule over all of Vietnam in 1975. For those who came after 
the Second Indochina War had ended, Thailand was simply a way 
station en route to somewhere else, usually the United States. 

Most of the 40,000 to 50,000 Vietnamese who came in 1946 and 
shortly thereafter were driven from Laos by the French, who were 
then reimposing their rule over all of Indochina. More Vietnamese 
came later, and, like those who came in the 1920s and 1930s, they 
expected to return to Vietnam. Between 1958 and 1964 (when the 
intensification of the war in Vietnam inhibited their return), ar- 
rangements were made for the repatriation of Vietnamese to the 
Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam), and an esti- 
mated 40,000 left Thailand. Over the years a few families went 
to the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam). The movements of 
this period, both voluntary and involuntary, left between 60,000 



79 



Thailand: A Country Study 



and 70,000 Vietnamese in Thailand, an undetermined portion of 
which were post-World War II migrants who could not or would 
not return to their homeland. 

The Chinese 

The largest number of non-Tai peoples were the Chinese. In 
1987 an estimated 1 1 percent of the total Thai population, or about 
6 million people, were of Chinese origin, which meant that Thailand 
had the largest Chinese population in Southeast Asia. Assimila- 
tion of the various Chinese communities was a continuing process. 
Chinese were encouraged to become Thai citizens, and in 1970 
it was estimated that more than 90 percent of the Chinese born 
in Thailand had done so. When diplomatic relations were estab- 
lished with China in the 1970s, resident Chinese not born in 
Thailand had the option of becoming Thai citizens; the remain- 
ing permanent Chinese alien population was estimated at fewer 
than 200,000. 

Given their historic role as middlemen, Chinese were found 
everywhere in Thailand, particularly in the towns. There was, 
however, a major concentration in the Bangkok metropolitan area 
and another in the central part of peninsular Thailand, where many 
Chinese were engaged in several capacities in the tin mines and 
on the rubber plantations. Although many Chinese played an im- 
portant part in the ownership and management of economic en- 
terprises and in the professions, a substantial portion had less 
lucrative and significant occupations (see National and Urban Struc- 
tures: Class and Status, this ch.). 

Except for a minority, the Chinese not only were Thai nation- 
als but also had, in some respects at least, assimilated into Thai 
society; many spoke Thai as well as they spoke Chinese. Most of 
the descendants of pretwentieth-century immigrants and those peo- 
ple of mixed Chinese-Thai ancestry (the so-called Sino-Thai — see 
Glossary) were so fully integrated into Thai society that they were 
not included in the Chinese population estimates. 

The accommodation between Thai and Chinese historically de- 
pended in part on the changing economic and political interests 
and perspectives of the Thai monarchs and others in the ruling 
group. Also relevant were the roles assigned to the Chinese at var- 
ious times, e.g., in the nineteenth century, that of tax farmers. 
Under the tax farming system, private individuals were sold the 
right to collect taxes at a price below the actual value of the taxes. 
The barriers between Thai and Chinese became more rigid in the 
early twentieth century with the emergence of Thai and Chinese 
nationalism and also the increased tendency of Chinese females 



80 



The Society and Its Environment 



to accompany male immigrants, which reduced the amount of inter- 
marriage. Consequently, despite a level of Chinese integration in 
the host society surpassing that found elsewhere in Southeast Asia, 
the Chinese remained a separate ethnic community, although the 
boundaries became less defined in the more mobile post- World War 
II society. The Chinese spoke a number of southern Chinese 
dialects, the most important being Teochiu, which was used by 
most Chinese as a commercial lingua franca. 

The South Asians 

In 1979 the Ministry of Interior estimated that there were 60,000 
Hindus and Sikhs in Thailand (0.13 percent of the total popula- 
tion). Small South Asian trading communities in southern Thailand 
were noted in a ninth-century Tamil inscription. In addition to 
being trade centers, these early Indian communities served as a 
conduit for Indian culture and political theory, especially during 
the Ayutthayan period. The modern South Asian community, 
however, was largely apolitical and attempted to blend into Thai 
society, its members working as tailors, night watchmen, and tex- 
tile merchants. 

Ethnic and Regional Relations 

In the past, the government took the position that all Tai peo- 
ple should be accorded all the rights, privileges, and opportunities 
that went with being a citizen. In the 1980s, members of non-Tai 
minority groups were being afforded similar rights, and efforts were 
being made to incorporate them into the Ekkalak Thai. The higher 
a person's aspirations, however, the more thoroughly he or she 
needed to assimilate into Central Thai culture. Thus, most of the 
representatives of the government were either from Central 
Thailand or had absorbed the perspective of that region. 

By law the Central Thai dialect was taught in all government 
schools, and all who aspired to government positions, from village 
headman on up, were expected to master Central Thai. Nonethe- 
less, because local dialects remained the medium of communica- 
tion in schools, markets, and provincial government offices, 
differences between the Central Thai and other dialects survived. 
The Central Thai tended to see other Thai as both different and 
inferior. In turn, the latter saw the Central Thai as exploiters. Inevi- 
tably, many non-Central Thai sometimes felt inferior to the Cen- 
tral Thai, who represented progress, prestige, wealth, and national 
power. 

In the past, the government had often ignored the needs of the 
outlying regions. Neglect, corrupt administration, and heavy 



81 



Thailand: A Country Study 

taxation perhaps affected the Thai-Lao more than others. Until 
King Mongkut established central control through administrators 
in the nineteenth century, the Thai- Lao region was governed by 
local Lao princes who were really vassals of the Thai monarch. 
Corvee (forced) labor and oppressive taxation supported a rapidly 
expanding Thai court, bureaucracy, and military. Peasant revolts 
erupted and were suppressed. Real social and economic changes 
did not began until the reign of King Bhumibol, who in the early 
1960s was assisted in these efforts by Prime Minister Sarit Thanarat, 
a northeasterner. In the 1960s, programs of community and agricul- 
tural development were coupled with counterinsurgency measures; 
these efforts continued into the 1980s with mixed results (see Insur- 
gency, ch. 5). 

The problems had accumulated over time, and solutions were 
difficult. Whether the tensions and the potential for conflict be- 
tween the central government and the Thai-Lao could be under- 
stood solely or even largely in ethnic terms was questionable. Besides 
ethnicity and regionalism, a number of other factors required con- 
sideration, including the inadequacy of most economic reform mea- 
sures and the insensitivity or repressiveness of administrators. The 
Central Thai lack of understanding of social forms and practices 
different from their own contributed to the mishandling of local 
situations and the imposition of so-called reforms without full con- 
sideration of the effects of these changes on the local people. The 
Thai-Lao had a close cultural and linguistic relationship with the 
people of Laos that was further strengthened by trade and kinship. 
Laos was viewed by many northeasterners as their home country. 

In the South the language, religion, and culture of the Malay 
or Thai Muslims were markedly different from those of other Thai. 
Although Islamic religious and cultural practices accentuated the 
differences, more divisive and destabilizing were economic and 
political factors. In the past, Central Thai administrators from the 
national government assigned to the South often spent their time 
amassing personal fortunes rather than attending to the welfare 
of the people of the region. Government provision of health, edu- 
cation, and welfare services was inadequate or nonexistent; schools 
were established only in the cities, for the benefit of children of 
Central Thai officials. In the 1980s, King Bhumibol and govern- 
ment leaders, especially those from the South, were deeply involved 
in rectifying those inequalities, but resentment and suspicion ham- 
pered development. 

Substantial numbers of Malay were loyalists who saw no point 
in making impossible demands. They were prepared to work within 
the system toward amelioration of their economic, educational, and 



82 



Laboratory technician at Rubber Research Center 

in southern Thailand 
Courtesy United Nations 

administrative situation. Those Malay were not prepared to become 
Thai culturally, but they saw government programs, including secu- 
lar education in Thai-language schools, as a means to social mo- 
bility and to an expansion of their administrative and economic 
roles. 

Because of severe restrictions on Chinese immigration that were 
put into effect in the early 1950s, the great majority of Thailand's 
Chinese in the late 1980s had been born in Thailand. Not only 
did most Chinese speak Thai, many also acquired Thai names (in 
addition to their Chinese ones) and were Mahayana Buddhists (one 
of the major schools of Buddhism, active in China, Japan, Korea, 
and Nepal). Although many Thai resented the significant role the 
Chinese played in commerce and envied their wealth, the Thai also 
admired Chinese industriousness and business acumen, a pattern 
common elsewhere in Southeast Asia. 

The Social System 

The rural areas, where most Thai live, have been affected by 
change for many decades, especially since the mid-nineteenth cen- 
tury, when the impact of European economic and political activ- 
ity was first felt. The full effects of change started to become manifest 
in the 1930s. Among the factors reflecting and creating change in 



83 



Thailand: A Country Study 



local social patterns was the coup of 1932, which brought military 
and bureaucratic elites into power and extended the power of the 
central government more effectively than before into rural areas. 
More important in its cumulative effect, however, was the rapid 
growth of the population and the consequent shortage of land, which 
led to the development of occupations outside agriculture and the 
emergence of a rural and small-town bourgeoisie. 

At the national level, society was stratified at the beginning of 
the twentieth century into three classes — kin of the reigning king 
and his immediate predecessors, government officials (often nobles 
granted their particular status by the king), and, by far the largest 
group, the peasantry. These classes comprised a social system in 
which those who had political power and status also had prestige 
and access to wealth. Buddhist monks had a special status outside 
this system. Also outside the system were the Chinese, who were 
largely laborers and small traders in the early twentieth century. 

As the twentieth century progressed, the government bureaucracy 
proliferated. A growing number in the higher ranks had their ori- 
gins outside the hereditary nobility, as did the upper ranks of the 
expanding armed forces. By the 1960s, the military and the 
bureaucracy included persons from several levels of the social and 
economic hierarchy. Directly or indirectly, the military and 
bureaucratic elites disposed of power and economic resources, the 
latter often in combination with those Chinese who controlled the 
major business enterprises of Thailand. Hereditary nobles retained 
high status, but they no longer wielded power and did not match 
some of the members of the military oligarchy in wealth. Monk- 
hood remained a source of special status and was an avenue of so- 
cial mobility for persons of rural origin with talent and a willingness 
to give part or all of their lives to the sangha, but monkhood was 
less and less attractive to urbanites or to those who had access to 
other avenues to power, wealth, and status. After World War II, 
an incipient urban middle class and an urban proletariat also 
emerged, particularly in Bangkok, partly in response to a commer- 
cial and tourist boom generated by the presence of large numbers 
of foreigners, particularly Americans. 

Still outside the social system, in the sense that their direct access 
to political power was restricted and that their sense of a worth- 
while career differed from that of most Thai, were the Chinese. 
Members of other non-Thai ethnic groups could occasionally make 
a place for themselves in the middle or upper reaches of Thai soci- 
ety by assimilating Thai culture. The Chinese were less able to 
do so until the 1960s and 1970s, when they began to move into 
the upper bureaucracy in larger numbers. 



84 



The Society and Its Environment 



More significant in the daily life of many Thai than differences 
in status was the relationship between patron and client. This link 
between two specific persons required the client to render services 
and other kinds of support in return for protection, the use of the 
patron's influence on the client's behalf, and occasional favors or 
financial aid. The basic pattern was old, but the relationship had 
evolved from a social one with economic overtones to one in which 
economic transactions and political support were more important. 

Rural Social Patterns 

Certain basic rural social patterns were discernable in modern 
Thai society. According to United States anthropologist Jack M. 
Potter, "The spatially defined rural village, which receives the 
allegiance of its members, furnishes an important part of their social 
identity, manages its own affairs and communal property, and has 
its own temple and school, is present in all parts of Thailand as 
an ideal cultural model, although in many cases the actual form 
of community life only approximates it." 

Affecting the degree to which specific communities approached 
the model were "ecological, economic and demographic circum- 
stances and the nature of rural administration," Potter writes. In 
the densely settled central plain, villages were often spatially 
indistinct, although boundaries defined by patterns of marriage, 
wat (Buddhist religious complex) attendance, and other social fac- 
tors might be discerned. In other cases, some of the important fea- 
tures of a functioning community were lacking. Thus, if the 
proportion of nonlandholders was high and if landowners were 
absentee and did not provide the social or political leadership typi- 
cally supplied by wealthy local peasants, community structure was 
weak. 

The wat in the 1980s remained the center of the rural commu- 
nity in many respects, although some of its functions, e.g., as an 
educational center, were lost, and it was increasingly difficult to 
retain monks. Most rural communities built and maintained a wat 
because, as Potter states, the Thai consider it "necessary for a civi- 
lized social existence." The wat included the special quarters and 
facilities reserved for monks, a building for public worship and re- 
ligious ceremony, and a community meeting place. Typically, the 
wat was run by a temple committee that consisted of prominent 
laymen as well as monks who had left the sangha without prejudice. 
Abbots and senior monks often enjoyed considerable prestige. In 
times of personal crisis, people often sought their advice. 

The wat was first of all a center for religious ceremony, much 
of which was regularly carried out according to a ritual calendar. 



85 



Thailand: A Country Study 



These scheduled rites involved the community as a whole, even 
if their ultimate purpose was the acquisition of merit by individu- 
als. Other irregularly held rites also took place in the wat and almost 
always included the community or a significant segment of it. The 
temple was also the locus for astrological and other quasi-magical 
activities. Although such rites were outside the canon of Buddhism, 
they were important to the community and were often carried out 
by monks. Thus, a person would go to a monk versed in these mat- 
ters to learn the propitious day for certain undertakings (for ex- 
ample, a wedding) or to be cured of certain illnesses by the 
application of holy water. A large wat usually had a crematorium; 
almost all dead were cremated. 

The temple committee often administered a loan fund from which 
the poor of the community might borrow in emergencies. The wat 
was also the repository of mats, dishes, and other housewares that 
could be borrowed by members of the community. If an aged per- 
son had nowhere else to go, the wat was a refuge. The wat was 
not reserved solely for serious matters; entertainment and dances 
open to the community were also held there. 

Within the village in the 1980s, the basic organizational unit was 
the family, which changed its character in the course of a develop- 
mental cycle. A nuclear family became, in time, a larger unit, but 
the death of the older generation once again left a nuclear family. 
Typically, a man went to live with the parents of the woman he 
married. Such residence was temporary except in the case of the 
youngest daughter. She and her husband (and their unmarried chil- 
dren) remained with her parents, taking care of them in their old 
age and inheriting the house when they died. Thus, at some point 
in the cycle, the household included what has been referred to as 
a matrilineal extended stem family: the aging parents, their youn- 
gest daughter and her husband, and the younger couple's children. 

Emerging from this developmental cycle was a cluster of related 
and cooperating households consisting of the extended stem fam- 
ily household and the households of those daughters who had set- 
tled nearby with their husbands. That pattern was predicated 
on the continuing control over land and other resources by the 
senior couple. The closeness of these related households and the 
extent of their cooperation in a range of domestic activities varied 
considerably. With a growing shortage of arable land in parts 
of the country and the aggregation of substantial holdings by a lim- 
ited number of landowners, the pattern was no longer as common 
as it had been. The senior couple may have had little or no land 
to allocate to their older daughters, and the daughters and their 
husbands may have had to move elsewhere. In the case of wholly 



86 



The Society and Its Environment 



landless agricultural workers, even the extended stem family might 
not be possible. 

Most villages were divided into local units or neighborhoods. 
In the North, neighborhoods were often the entities that on a weekly 
basis collectively provided food for the monks in the local wat, but 
these neighborhoods also engaged in other forms of cooperation. 
Inasmuch as the nucleus of a neighborhood, perhaps all of it, often 
consisted of related households, activities such as house-raisings 
might be undertaken in response to either territorial or kinship re- 
quirements. If the community was the result of relatively recent 
pioneering by landless families from other communities, the neigh- 
borhood was important, and those living in the same area might 
come to address each other in kinship terms. 

The labor exchange system was initially based on villagers' rela- 
tive parity in landholding and their participation in subsistence 
agriculture. Typically, those involved in an exchange system were 
kin or neighbors, but the system sometimes extended beyond these 
categories. Each household arranged with others to provide labor 
at various stages in the agricultural cycle; in return, the same num- 
ber of units of labor would be provided to those who had worked 
for it. Besides a labor exchange, the system provided opportuni- 
ties for socializing and feasting. Although the arrangements were 
made by a single household with other specific households, the 
regularity with which representatives of households worked together 
gave the households a grouplike character. 

The growing commercialization of agriculture in certain parts 
of the country and increasing landlessness and tenancy in the 1980s 
diminished the ubiquity of reciprocal work arrangements. Wealthy 
peasants hired labor; those who had no land or too little to subsist 
on worked for wages. Commercialization alone, however, did not 
prevent the use of a labor exchange system if those in it held roughly 
equivalent amounts of land. In some cases, a household would hire 
labor for one task and engage in the exchange system for others. 

Peasants could be categorized on the basis of the nature of their 
land rights and the quantity of the land they held. The holdings 
that made a peasant family rich in one part of Thailand might not 
make it rich elsewhere. A rich rural family was one with substan- 
tial landholdings, some of which it might rent out. Moreover, if 
a family had the capital to hire agricultural labor and the imple- 
ments necessary to cultivate additional land, it might rent plots 
from others. In any case, such a family would rely almost exclu- 
sively on hired labor rather than on the system of labor exchange, 
and it was likely to invest in other local enterprises, such as rice 
mills, thereby acquiring additional sources of income. The category 



87 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of rich peasants could be subdivided into those with very large quan- 
tities of land and those with smaller but still substantial amounts. 
Usually that distinction would correlate with the magnitude of their 
nonfarming enterprises and the extent to which they had money 
to lend to others. In any case, rich peasants tended to be creditors, 
while other peasants were often debtors. 

At the other end of the scale were the agricultural laborers, who 
held no land as owners or tenants except, perhaps, for the small 
plot on which their houses stood. To the extent that opportunities 
were available, they supported themselves as hired farm workers. 
Life was so precarious for some families, however, that they had 
to resort to hunting and gathering. Between the wealthy peasants 
and agricultural workers were two other categories. The families 
in the first group had sufficient land (some of it rented) to meet 
their own rice needs. If there were a crop surplus, it would be sold, 
but the families in this category did not produce primarily for the 
market, as the rich peasants did. They might also acquire cash 
through wage labor from time to time if opportunities were avail- 
able. The families in the second category owned less land and had 
to rent additional parcels. Owned and rented holdings combined, 
however, did not always provide the means for subsistence, so these 
families frequently had to resort to wage labor. Not all tenants were 
poor. In some cases, tenants did well in good crop and market years, 
particularly in central Thailand. In general, however, the tenant 
farmer's situation was precarious. Rents, whether in cash or in kind, 
tended to be fixed without regard for the size of the harvest, and 
in a bad year tenant farmer families were likely to go into debt. 
Tenants and agricultural laborers had little or nothing of their own 
to pass on to their children. 

In some areas, particularly in central Thailand, the land was 
controlled by absentee landlords who lived in Bangkok or in 
provincial towns and for whom landownership was another form 
of investment. They could have direct or indirect effect on the 
social and political lives of their tenants, and some occasionally 
acted as patrons to their tenants. At the local level, however, it 
was the rich peasant who wielded political power and was granted 
deference by others in the community. Differences in wealth were 
consistent with the Thai villager's understanding of the Buddhist 
concept of merit (see Religion, this ch.). According to this view, 
the accumulation of merit led not to nirvana but to a better per- 
sonal situation in this world, preferably in this life. Wealth signi- 
fied that one had merit. One might, therefore, demonstrate one's 
merit by striving and succeeding. Villagers at the lower end of the 
social scale, however, sometimes questioned the doctrine of merit 



88 



Central Thailand's vast network of waterways 
serves as a means of transportation and irrigation 
Courtesy United Nations 

if they perceived the behavior of those at the upper end as un- 
righteous. 

Most observers agreed that the patron-client relationship was 
pervasive in Thai society, not only at the village level but throughout 
the military and the bureaucracy. There was less agreement on 
its links to a class system and the degree to which the relationship 
was typically marked by social ties of affection and concern as 
opposed to a clearly calculated assessment of relative economic or 
political advantage. At the village level, it was not necessary to be 
rich to have a client, although a wealthy family was likely to have 
more than one client. It was possible for an ordinary peasant 
(although not a landless one) to provide limited benefits to some- 
one less fortunate in return for certain services. Often such a rela- 
tionship was arranged between kin. In the modern era, however, 
it was the wealthy villager who could provide benefits and expect, 
even demand, certain services from his client. 

In principle, a patron-client relationship lasted only so long as 
both parties gained something from it, and the relationship could 
be broken at the option of either. Often, however, the client had 
few alternatives and would remain in the relationship in the hope 
of eliciting more benefits than had hitherto been forthcoming. To 
the extent, however, that prestige and power accrued to the person 



89 



Thailand: A Country Study 

(or family) who had and could retain a large number of clients, 
the patron was motivated to provide benefits to those dependent 
on him. 

The patron-client relationship also linked villagers and persons 
at other levels of the social, political, and economic orders: lead- 
ing figures in the village, themselves patrons of others in the rural 
community, became clients of officials, politicians, or traders at 
the district or provincial levels. In such cases, clientship might rein- 
force the status of the rich villager who could, at least occasionally, 
call on his patron at a higher level for benefits that he might in 
turn use to bind his own clients to him. Just the fact that the rich 
villager was known to have a powerful patron outside the village 
could enhance his status. 

National and Urban Structures: Class and Status 

Although in the 1980s the hierarchy of social status or prestige 
and the hierarchy of political and economic power in the rural com- 
munity overlapped, a disjunction of sorts existed between them at 
the national level. A rich villager — other things being equal — 
wielded political and economic power and had prestige. In the na- 
tional system, the hierarchy of status began with the hereditary 
nobility — the royal family and the holders of royal titles. None of 
these people were poor; the royal family owned much land and 
some of its members had political influence. The royal family was 
not part of the ruling class, however, nor did it control the econ- 
omy. The ruling class consisted of several levels, the uppermost 
of which comprised the military and, to a lesser extent, the 
bureaucratic elite. 

In general, the Thai accorded high status to those who wielded 
power, and the prestige accorded the highest bureaucrats was con- 
sistent with a historical pattern, even if in modern times these 
bureaucrats were rarely members of the royal family. Whether the 
position of the military was fully legitimated in the eyes of most 
Thai was uncertain. The military was given deference, but it was. 
not clear that its members were freely accorded esteem. 

Below the military and bureaucratic elites were those in high 
government posts who performed the tasks requiring considerable 
knowledge, technical competence, or simply experience in the ways 
of bureaucracy. Like the bureaucratic elites, these upper middle- 
level bureaucrats were well educated, often holding undergraduate 
or graduate degrees from foreign universities. From the point of 
view of the Thai, such officeholders had much prestige even if they 
were not the primary wielders of power. 



90 



The Society and Its Environment 



Positions at the highest levels of the military and the bureau- 
cracy brought very good incomes to those holding them. Often these 
positions provided access to other sources of income, including large 
landholdings and other real estate, or participation in the actual 
ownership of businesses, often in conjunction with Chinese business- 
men. With some exceptions, the latter exercised day-to-day con- 
trol of financial, commercial, and industrial organizations and 
institutions. 

The social status of the Chinese economic elite was not clear. 
After World War II, a limited number of Chinese business fami- 
lies, who had begun as middlemen financing aspects of agricul- 
tural production and marketing, became bankers and industrial 
and commercial entrepreneurs. These families had considerable 
economic power, and they clearly influenced some political deci- 
sions through the Thai military and bureaucrats with whom they 
had connections. Whether the Thai in general granted them the 
prestige ordinarily given to those holding high posts in government 
was another matter. 

These Chinese businessmen should be distinguished from the 
many Thai in the military and the civil bureaucracy who had 
Chinese ancestry. In many cases, this Chinese ancestry was several 
generations removed. In any case, such individuals were considered 
Thai, operated chiefly in a Thai social and cultural milieu, and 
were evaluated on the same social scale as other Thai. 

Until the 1970s, persons who were fully Chinese entered the 
bureaucracy only at the middle levels or, if higher, as technical 
staff. This was in part a matter of Thai policy, in part a matter 
of Chinese orientation. The Chinese were not indifferent to politi- 
cal power or administrative skill as desirable qualities or as sources 
of prestige, but they adapted to the limits imposed by their minority 
status. Within the Chinese community there was a hierarchy of 
political influence, and there were organizations (ranging from 
chambers of commerce to community groups and mutual aid 
societies) in which Chinese had the opportunity to exercise their 
power and skills. Even there, however, political power and pres- 
tige flowed to those who had been successful as entrepreneurs, 
whereas among the Thai, achievement in the military or the 
bureaucracy preceded access to significant economic opportunities 
or resources. Chinese in the economic elite who moved into im- 
portant positions in Chinese-centered organizations or, occasion- 
ally, other organizations, not only gained prestige within the 
Chinese community but also became the links between that com- 
munity and Thai elites, particularly with respect to the establish- 
ment of economic ties. 



91 



Thailand: A Country Study 

By the early 1970s, significant numbers of Chinese had been 
admitted to the higher bureaucracy. According to one analyst, they 
held roughly 30 percent of the posts in the special grades (upper 
ranks) at that time. Presumably they were the sons and daughters 
of wealthy entrepreneurs and had acquired the higher education 
necessary for admission to the bureaucracy's upper ranks. 

Below the hereditary nobility and the ruling class was a socially 
and occupationally heterogeneous middle class that emerged in the 
years after World War II, especially after 1960. Its members were 
diverse with respect to their control over wealth, their social sta- 
tus, and their access to power. The simplest distinction within this 
amorphous category was based partially on income and partially 
on occupation, but subcategories thus drawn were rather mixed. 
The wealthier segment of this middle class (for convenience, the 
upper middle class) consisted of bureaucrats and military men at 
middle levels (including higher provincial officials), salaried 
administrative and managerial workers in private enterprise, 
middle-level businessmen, provincial notables and landlords liv- 
ing in provincial towns, and professionals. A much larger group, 
the petty bourgeoisie, comprised those who provided a range of 
services, largely in Bangkok, to the ruling class, the upper middle 
class, and to tourists and other foreigners. Often this petty bour- 
geoisie consisted of small-scale independent businessmen, some of 
them shop owners, others furnishing their services contractually. 
Some were salaried clerical staff. Both upper and lower segments 
of this middle category include many Chinese as well as Thai. 

In the Thai scale of values, higher prestige tended to be accorded 
to those in government employment and perhaps to those in the 
professions. The private sector as a source of substantial income 
was a relatively new idea to the Thai, however, and their scale of 
values might change as an entrepreneurial bourgeoisie began seek- 
ing to have its status validated. In any case, the elements in the 
upper segment of this middle category could be said to share the 
same outlook and values or the same political status implied in the 
notion of class. The position of bureaucrats and notables (middle- 
level businessmen and landowners) who lived in provincial towns 
was of particular interest. On their home ground they exercised 
considerable power, formally and informally, but they owed this 
power at least in part to their connections, usually as clients to 
patrons in Bangkok, although they in turn had clients at lower levels. 

There was also a lower urban stratum, but this too was heter- 
ogeneous. On the one hand, there were the more or less steady 
wage workers in commercial and industrial enterprises, mainly in 
Bangkok (and in mining outside Bangkok). On the other hand, 



92 



The Society and Its Environment 



there were large numbers of persons, like the wage workers, often 
from rural areas, who had no steady work and sought to eke out 
a living by offering their services as unskilled labor. 

There were two other urban groups that were not part of the 
status hierarchy. Just as the monks of a village wat were outside 
the local rural system of stratification but enjoyed a special status, 
so too was the hierarchy of the sangha, the highest elements of which 
were located in Bangkok. Within the monkhood, the supreme patri- 
arch and the Council of Elders exercised considerable authority, 
and they were given a great deal of deference by laymen, even those 
in the royal family and the ruling class. They did not have signifi- 
cant power outside the sangha, although some monks have had a 
substantial impact on politics. 

Also outside the urban status hierarchy — but sometimes with 
higher incomes than those in the upper middle class and themselves 
requiring the services of those in the lower middle category — were 
the many men and women engaged in illegal activities that were 
nonetheless countenanced or protected. Among them were prosti- 
tutes, pimps, and narcotics dealers. In the mid-1980s, the num- 
ber of women in Bangkok estimated to be engaged in prostitution 
or in related services ranged from 100,000 to 1 million. Some ob- 
servers noted that prostitution was firmly entrenched in modern 
Thailand as a result of historical, economic, and social factors. The 
majority of Bangkok prostitutes were rural migrants providing eco- 
nomic support to relatives back in the country, which was expected 
of Thai daughters within the extended stem family system. In other 
words, Thai prostitutes were not fleeing from a family background 
or rural society that oppressed women in conventional ways but 
were engaging in an entrepreneurial move designed to sustain the 
family units of the rural economy, which had come under increas- 
ing pressure. Since these women usually did not reveal the source 
of their remittances back to the village, their families could retain 
or gain status based upon their earnings. 

Class Consciousness 

Of the categories or strata discernible in Thai society, only one — 
the royal family and the hereditary nobility — constituted a self- 
conscious group. It was not clear that class consciousness had de- 
veloped among the power elites or upper middle-level bureaucrats 
by the 1980s, in spite of their shared views and aspirations. 
Nevertheless, as social mobility diminished, which it had begun 
to do in the early 1980s, and as each category or section increas- 
ingly generated its own replacements, distinct status groups might 
emerge. Outwardly there were many indications of a conscious 



93 



Thailand: A Country Study 



middle class, consumer-oriented, cosmopolitan way of life. For 
example, golf, tennis, delicatessens, fast-food restaurants, boutiques, 
and shopping malls were very popular among the Thai residents 
of Bangkok in the late 1980s. 

Militating against solidarity, particularly at the upper and mid- 
dle levels, was the continuing competition for political power and 
the access to economic opportunities and resources that flowed from 
such power. People competing for high-level positions in the mili- 
tary, the bureaucracy, or within the economy were engaged in a 
complex and shifting pattern of patron-client relationships. In this 
system, all but the individuals at the highest and lowest ends of 
a chain of such relationships were simultaneously patrons to one 
or more others and clients to someone above them. A developing 
career was likely to put a person at different places in the chain 
at various stages. 

Given the fluctuations in the fortunes of individuals (to which 
the patron-client system contributed), patrons and clients, partic- 
ularly at the higher levels, had to make judgments as to the benefits 
accruing to them from their relationship. Moreover, a client had 
to assess present and potential sources of power and the extent to 
which his support and services would be reciprocated by the cur- 
rent or alternative patrons. It was not uncommon in this system 
for both patrons and clients to shift allegiances. Patrons often had 
several clients, but there were no real bonds between the clients 
of a single patron. 

Social Mobility 

The expansion of the bureaucracy and the military and the move- 
ment of the Thai into a rapidly growing private sector created 
opportunities for social mobility, although the major part of the 
population remained rural workers or moved into low-level occu- 
pations in the urban labor force. Associated with upward mobil- 
ity, given the Thai orientation toward bureaucratic careers, was 
the availability of education. Expansion of education facilities 
beyond the secondary level occurred in the early 1970s. In 1961, 
for example, about 42,000 full-time and part-time students were 
enrolled in 6 higher education institutions, but by 1972 there were 
roughly 72,000 in more than a dozen institutions. The oldest and 
most prestigious universities, such as Chulalongkorn, Thammasat, 
and Mahidol, were in Bangkok. Many students attended univer- 
sities outside Thailand, but these were more likely to be the chil- 
dren of Thai or Chinese who had already attained a fairly high 
socioeconomic position. 



94 



Homeless people living under bridge in Bangkok 
Courtesy United Nations 

Education was necessary for entry into the bureaucracy, but other 
capabilities or characteristics, including political reliability and 
involvement in the patron-client system, also played a part in up- 
ward mobility within the bureaucracy. In the military, the system 
played perhaps a greater role than education. Military expertise 
as such did not seem to be an important consideration. 

The sangha offered a special avenue of social mobility to some 
of the sons of the peasants at the base of Thailand's socioeconomic 
pyramid. Positions in the upper tiers were filled by examination, 
and monks were offered higher education at two Buddhist univer- 
sities (Mahachulalongkorn and Mahamongkut), which by the 1960s 
included significant secular components in their curricula. The 
Buddhist education system provided support for its talented stu- 
dents through the highest level; access to these opportunities by 
villagers might reflect the declining interest among the urban classes 
and the provincial middle group in a career in the sangha. The social 
mobility achieved through the sangha was not necessarily limited 
to those who were lifetime monks. Monks who left the sangha in 
their thirties and forties could legitimately enter other careers, and 
their education and experience in the sangha were helpful. 

By the mid-1970s, the number of aspirants to the bureaucracy 
with undergraduate and even graduate degrees had begun to exceed 
the number of openings. Moreover, the economy was no longer 



95 



Thailand: A Country Study 

expanding as it had in the 1960s and early 1970s (see Economic 
and Financial Development, ch. 3). Opportunities for upward 
mobility had lessened in the early 1980s, and children of families 
already established in the upper or middle reaches of the socioeco- 
nomic system were able to maintain their head start in a system 
that was no longer growing so rapidly. 

Religion 

Theravada Buddhism, the form of Buddhism practiced in Sri 
Lanka, Burma, Cambodia, and Laos, was the religion of more than 
80 percent of the Thai people in the 1980s. These coreligionists 
included not only the core Thai, but most other Tai speakers, as 
well as the Khmer, the Mon, and some members of other minori- 
ties, among them the Chinese. Relatively few Thai were adher- 
ents of Mahayana Buddhism or other religions, including 
Hinduism, Christianity, Taoism, animism, and Islam. Of these 
only Islam, largely identified with but not restricted to Southern 
Thai of Malay origin, was a dominant religion in a specific geo- 
graphic area. 

Theravada Buddhism was the established religion, in that there 
were formal organizational and ideological links between it and 
the state. Thai rulers (the king formerly, and the military and 
bureaucratic oligarchy subsequently) sought or — if they thought 
it necessary — commanded the support of the Buddhist clergy or 
sangha, who usually acquiesced to (if not welcomed) the state's sup- 
port and protection. A Thai religious writer pointed out that 
Thailand was the only country in the world where the king was 
constitutionally required to be a Buddhist and upholder of the faith. 

Buddhism's place in Thai society was by no means defined solely 
by its relation to the state. The role of religious belief and institu- 
tions in Thai life had changed, and, with increasing commercial- 
ism and urbanization, some observers questioned the prevalence 
of Thai piety and good works. However, the peasant's or villager's 
view of the world remained at least partly defined by an under- 
standing of Buddhist doctrine, and significant events in his or her 
life and community were marked by rituals performed or at least 
supervised by Buddhist clergy. Often, the villager's city-dwelling 
siblings would return to the home village for significant events such 
as weddings and funerals. Additionally, much of Thai village life — 
social, political, economic, and religious — centered on the local wot. 

As is often the case when a scripturally based religion becomes 
dominant in a largely agrarian society, the religious beliefs and 
behavior of most Thai were compounded of elements derived from 
both formal doctrine and other sources. The latter either developed 



96 



The Society and Its Environment 



during the long history of Buddhism or derived from religious sys- 
tems indigenous to the area. Implementation of the same Buddhist 
rite and tradition often varied from region to region. In Central 
Thailand, for example, praiseworthy priests were selected and hon- 
ored by the king, whereas in the Northeast this recognition was 
bestowed by the people. 

Historical Background 

Thai Buddhism was based on the religious movement founded 
in the sixth century B.C. by Siddhartha Gautama Sakyamuni, later 
known as the Buddha, who urged the world to relinquish the 
extremes of sensuality and self-mortification and follow the enlight- 
ened Middle Way. The focus was on man, not gods; the assump- 
tion was that life was pain or suffering, which was a consequence 
of craving, and that suffering could end only if desire ceased. The 
end of suffering was the achievement of nirvana (in Theravada Bud- 
dhist scriptures, nibbana), often defined negatively as the absence 
of craving and therefore of suffering, sometimes as enlightenment 
or bliss. 

By the third century B.C., Buddhism had spread widely in Asia, 
and divergent interpretations of the Buddha's teachings had led 
to the establishment of several sects. The teachings that reached 
Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka) were given in a final written form 
in Pali (an Indo-Aryan language closely related to Sanskrit) to 
religious centers there in the first century A.D. and provided the 
Tipitaka (the scriptures or "three baskets"; in Sanskrit, Tripitaka) 
of Theravada Buddhism. This form of Buddhism reached what is 
now Thailand around the sixth century A.D. Theravada Buddhism 
was made the state religion only with the establishment of the Thai 
kingdom of Sukhothai in the thirteenth century A.D. (see Early 
History, ch. 1). 

The details of the history of Buddhism in Thailand from the thir- 
teenth to the nineteenth century are obscure, in part because few 
historical records or religious texts survived the Burmese destruc- 
tion of Ayutthaya, the capital city of the kingdom, in 1767. The 
anthropologist-historian S.J. Tambiah, however, has suggested a 
general pattern for that era, at least with respect to the relations 
between Buddhism and the sangha on the one hand and the king 
on the other hand. In Thailand, as in other Theravada Buddhist 
kingdoms, the king was in principle thought of as patron and pro- 
tector of the religion {sasana) and the sangha, while sasana and the 
sangha were considered in turn the treasures of the polity and the 
signs of its legitimacy. Religion and polity, however, remained 



97 



Thailand: A Country Study 

separate domains, and in ordinary times the organizational links 
between the sangha and the king were not close. 

Among the chief characteristics of Thai kingdoms and princi- 
palities in the centuries before 1800 were the tendency to expand 
and contract, problems of succession, and the changing scope of 
the king's authority. In effect, some Thai kings had greater power 
over larger territories, others less, and almost invariably a king who 
sought successfully to expand his power also exercised greater con- 
trol over the sangha. That control was coupled with greater sup- 
port and patronage of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. When a king 
was weak, however, protection and supervision of the sangha also 
weakened, and the sangha declined. This fluctuating pattern ap- 
pears to have continued until the emergence of the Chakkri Dynasty 
in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. 

By the nineteenth century, and especially with the coming to 
power in 1851 of King Mongkut, who had been a monk himself 
for twenty-seven years, the sangha, like the kingdom, became steadily 
more centralized and hierarchical in nature and its links to the state 
more institutionalized. As a monk, Mongkut was a distinguished 
scholar of Pali Buddhist scripture. Moreover, at that time the im- 
migration of numbers of Mon from Burma was introducing the 
more rigorous discipline characteristic of the Mon sangha. Influenced 
by the Mon and guided by his own understanding of the Tipitaka, 
Mongkut began a reform movement that later became the basis 
for the Dhammayuttika order of monks. Under the reform, all prac- 
tices having no authority other than custom were to be abandoned, 
canonical regulations were to be followed not mechanically but in 
spirit, and acts intended to improve an individual's standing on 
the road to nirvana but having no social value were rejected. This 
more rigorous discipline was adopted in its entirety by only a small 
minority of monasteries and monks. The Mahanikaya order, 
perhaps somewhat influenced by Mongkut' s reforms but with a 
less exacting discipline than the Dhammayuttika order, comprised 
about 95 percent of all monks in 1970 and probably about the same 
percentage in the late 1980s. In any case, Mongkut was in a posi- 
tion to regularize and tighten the relations between monarchy and 
sangha at a time when the monarchy was expanding its control over 
the country in general and developing the kind of bureaucracy 
necessary to such control. The administrative and sangha reforms 
that Mongkut started were continued by his successor. In 1902 King 
Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 1868-1910) made the new sangha hier- 
archy formal and permanent through the Sangha Law of 1902, 
which remained the foundation of sangha administration in modern 
Thailand. 



98 



Procession of decorated rockets for Fire Festival 
Courtesy Tourism Authority of Thailand 

Buddhist Doctrine and Popular Religion 

The doctrine of Theravada Buddhism can be found in the three- 
part Tipitaka. The first of the three baskets (or sections) sets forth 
the discipline governing the monastic order. The second presents 
the sermons or discourses of the Buddha and contains the dharma 
(literally, doctrine). The third comprises the commentaries and 
explications produced by learned monks in the centuries after the 
death of the Buddha. It is here that significant differences exist 
between Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism. 

In the first basket, and central to the structure of Buddhist belief, 
are the doctrines of karma, the sum and the consequences of an 
individual's actions during the successive phases of his existence, 
and samsara, the eternal cycle of birth, death, and rebirth. Both 
doctrines were derived from the Indian thought of the Buddha's 
time, although he invested the concept of karma with very strong 
ethical implications. Broadly, these ideas taken together assert that 
evil acts have evil consequences for those committing them, and 
good acts yield good consequences, not necessarily in any one life- 
time, but over the inevitable cycle of births and deaths. A concomi- 
tant to the belief in karma and samsara is the view that all forms 
of life are related because every form originated in a previous one. 
In the canonical view, but not in the popular one, the entity that 



99 



Thailand: A Country Study 

undergoes reincarnation is not the soul (although the idea of soul 
exists) but a complex of attributes — actions and their conse- 
quences — that taken together are said to constitute the karma of 
an individual. It is karma in this sense that survives in another form. 

The second basket, containing the dharma, provides the essen- 
tials that define the way to nirvana. The foundation of the system 
lies in the Four Noble Truths: suffering exists, it is caused by craving 
or desire, it can be made to cease, and it can be brought to an end 
by following the Noble Eightfold Path. The last Noble Truth con- 
tains the eight precepts to be followed by Buddhists: right view, 
or having an understanding of the Four Noble Truths; right 
thought — freedom from lust, ill will, and cruelty; right speech, 
which means abstention from lying, gossiping, harsh language, and 
vain talk; right action, by which killing, stealing, and sexual mis- 
conduct are proscribed; right livelihood, which requires an indi- 
vidual's sustenance be earned in a way that is not harmful to living 
things; right effort, by which good thoughts are encouraged and 
bad thoughts are avoided or overcome; right mindfulness, or close 
attention to all states of the body, feeling, and mind; and right con- 
centration, that is, concentration on a single object to bring about 
a special state of consciousness in meditation. Following the Noble 
Eightfold Path conscientiously is necessary if a person aspires to 
become an arhat (usually translated as saint), ready for nirvana. 

Virtually from the beginning, however, the Buddha acknowl- 
edged that it would be difficult for a layperson to follow all aspects 
of the Noble Eightfold Path singlemindedly. The conditions appro- 
priate to such pursuit are available only to mendicant monks. The 
demands on the layperson are therefore less rigorous, and most 
interpret the doctrine as requiring acts gaining merit so that the 
layperson may achieve a condition in the next life that will allow 
stricter attention to the requirements of the path. 

The acts that bring merit are, in principle, those that conform 
as closely as possible to the ethical demands of the Noble Eightfold 
Path. Acts that support the brotherhood of monks are also included. 
Consequently, providing material support, e.g., food, to the mem- 
bers of the sangha, showing them deference, underwriting and par- 
ticipating in certain ceremonies, and supporting the construction 
and maintenance of the wat have come to be the chief methods of 
gaining merit. The powerful ethical content of the Noble Eight- 
fold Path is reduced to five precepts or injunctions. The laity are 
expected to refrain from the following: taking life, stealing, lying, 
engaging in illicit sexual relations, and drinking intoxicating liquors. 
Thai Buddhists — like many followers of other religions — select only 



100 



The Society and Its Environment 



a few of the Buddha's teachings to guide them. Many Buddhist 
principles, while not actually practiced, are venerated as ideals. 

According to some observers, most Thai place little emphasis 
on the achievement of nirvana, whether as a final state after many 
rebirths or as an interior condition. What is hoped for is an im- 
proved condition in this life or the next. In Thai thinking, the ideas 
of merit and demerit so essential to the doctrine of karma are linked 
linguistically to those of good and evil; good and merit are both 
bun; evil and the absence of merit are bap. The Theravada idea 
of karma (and the Thai peasant's understanding of it) charges the 
individual with responsibility for good and evil acts and their con- 
sequences. Thai do not rely solely on the accumulation of merit, 
however gained, to bring that improved state into being. Other 
forms of causality, ranging from astrology to the action of spirits 
of various kinds, are also part of their outlook. 

The world of the Thai villager (and that of many city folk as 
well) is inhabited by a host of spirits of greater or lesser relevance 
to an individual's well-being. Although many of these are not sanc- 
tioned by Buddhist scripture or even by Buddhist tradition, many 
monks, themselves of rural origin and essentially tied to the vil- 
lage, are as likely as the peasant to accept the beliefs and rituals 
associated with spirits. 

Most important are the spirits included in the rather heterogene- 
ous category of phi, thought to have power over human beings. 
The category includes spirits believed to have a permanent exis- 
tence and others that are reincarnations of deceased human be- 
ings. Phi exist virtually everywhere — in trees, hills, water, animals, 
the earth, and so on. Some are malevolent, others beneficial. 

The ghosts of persons who died violently under mysterious cir- 
cumstances or whose funeral rites were improperly performed con- 
stitute another class of phi; almost all of these spirits are malevolent. 
In contrast, the ghosts of notable people are said to reside in small 
shrines along the roads and are referred to as "spirit lords. ' ' They 
are often petitioned in prayers and can enter and possess the bod- 
ies of mediums to give oracles. Among the more important of the 
spirits and ghosts is the evil phi pop (ghoul spirit), which, at the 
instigation of witches, can enter human beings and consume their 
internal organs. 

Another category consists of the chao (guardian spirits), of which 
perhaps the most important is the chao thi, or guardian of the house 
compound (an alternative name is phra phum). Fixed on a post in 
the compound of most houses in Thailand's central region is a small 
spirit dwelling. Food offerings are made to the chao thi on the 
anniversary of the spirit's installation in the house, on New Year's 



101 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Day, and on other special days. The spirit is told of the arrival 
of guests who are to stay any length of time, of projected journeys 
by members of the family, and of births and deaths. The spirit's 
intercession is also sought during illness and misfortune. 

Other spirits protect gardens, the rice fields, and the wat. The 
spirit of the rice field is worshiped only once a year, at the begin- 
ning of the rice planting; the Rice Goddess receives offerings when 
the seedbed is to be prepared and when the harvest is ready. The 
Mother Earth Goddess often receives offerings at transplanting time. 

In addition to the rites dedicated to an assortment of spirits either 
regularly or as the occasion demands, other rites intended to max- 
imize merit for the participants are practiced. The Buddha 
prescribed no ceremonies for birth, death, and marriage, but the 
Hindu rites, which were adopted by the Thai people, entail the 
participation of Buddhist monks. The ceremonies, which are held 
at home rather than in the wat, have no scriptural sanction. The 
monks limit their participation to chanting the appropriate Bud- 
dhist scriptural texts or to providing holy water. 

The propitiation of an individual's khwan (body spirit or life soul) 
remains a basic feature of Thai family rites. Any ceremony under- 
taken to benefit a person, animal, or plant is referred to as the mak- 
ing of khwan. On important occasions, such as birth, ordination 
into the priesthood, marriage, a return from a long journey, or 
the reception of an honored guest, a khwan ceremony is performed. 

Of all the life cycle and family ceremonies, funeral rites are the 
most elaborate. When a person is dying, he or she should fix his 
or her mind on the Buddhist scriptures or repeat some of the names 
of the Buddha. If the last thoughts of the dying person are directed 
toward the Buddha and his precepts, the fruits of this meritorious 
behavior will be repaid to the deceased in the next incarnation. 
After his or her death, other meritorious acts are performed for 
the benefit of the deceased, such as attendance at the wake and 
provision of food to the officiating monks. Every effort is made 
to banish sorrow, loneliness, and fear of the spirits by means of 
music and fellowship. 

Ceremonies in the wat consist of those that benefit the entire com- 
munity and those that primarily affect the sangha. The first kind 
include the rites held on such occasions as Mahka Bucha (an im- 
portant February holiday that marks the beginning of the season 
for making pilgrimages to Phra Phuttabaht, the Buddha's Foot- 
print Shrine), Wisakha Bucha (a festival commemorating the Bud- 
dha's birth, enlightenment, and death), Khao Phansa (the holiday 
marking the beginning of the three-month Buddhist holy season, 
July to October), and Thot Kathin (a festival during which robes 



102 



The Society and Its Environment 



and other items are given to the monks by the laity). Ceremonies 
that primarily concern the sangha include ordination, confession, 
recitation of the 227 monastic rules, and distribution of new robes 
after Thot Kathin. 

Of all the ceremonies affecting the sangha, ordination is the one 
in which the laity are most involved, both physically and spiritually. 
Frequently, before a young man makes his initial entry into the 
sangha, a ceremony is held in the home of the aspirant to prepare 
him for ordination. His khwan is invited to enter the sangha with 
him; otherwise, evil and illness might befall him. He is informed 
of his parents' happiness with his decision, of the sacrifices they 
have made for him, and of the life of austerity and discipline he 
is to begin. In Thailand, it is a popular belief that by becoming 
a monk great merit is gained, merit which also accrues to persons 
or parents who sponsor the ordination. 

The Sangha 

The sangha comprises two sects or schools, the Mahanikaya and 
the Dhammayuttika. The first has far more members than the 
second, but the Dhammayuttika — exercising a more rigorous dis- 
cipline, having a reputation for scholarship in the doctrine, and 
having a close connection to royalty — continues to wield influence 
beyond its numbers among intellectuals and in sangha administra- 
tion. Both schools are included in the same ecclesiastical hierar- 
chy, which is very closely tied to the government. The strengthening 
of those ties began in the nineteenth century, ostensibly to deal 
with problems of internal disorganization in the sangha but also so 
that the sangha could be used to help integrate a government that 
was just beginning to extend and strengthen its administrative con- 
trol over the North and Northeast. Each of these regions in effect 
had had its own sangha, and the unification of the sangha was seen 
as an important step toward the unification of Thailand. The pat- 
tern of legislative and other steps culminating in the Sangha Act 
of 1963 tended to tighten government control of the sangha; there 
was no significant resistance to this control from the monks. Con- 
flicts existed between the two schools, however, over issues such 
as position in the hierarchy. 

In spite of a long tradition of monkhood in Thailand, the great 
majority of males did not become monks. Those who did usually 
entered in their early twenties but did not necessarily remain monks 
for a long time. During the three-month holy season (Khao Phansa), 
sometimes referred to as the Buddhist Lent, monks go into retreat, 
and more attention than usual is given to the study of dharma. 
In the mid-1980s, Thai male civil servants were given three months' 



103 



Thailand: A Country Study 

leave with full pay if they spent the Lenten period as monks. It 
has been estimated that the proportion of temporary monks dur- 
ing this period varies between 25 and 40 percent of the total. The 
motivation for monkhood of such short duration is complex, but 
even the temporary status, for those who are unable or unwilling 
to commit themselves to the discipline for life, brings merit, not 
only to the monk but also to his parents, particularly to his mother. 
(Some Buddhist women live as nuns, but they enjoy lower status 
than monks do.) Whether temporary or permanent, a monk in prin- 
ciple is subject to the 227 rules of conduct embodied in that por- 
tion (basket) of the Tipitaka devoted to the sangha. 

Aside from the religious motivation of those who enter and 
remain in the sangha, another inducement for many is the chance 
to pursue the contemplative life within the monastic community. 
Other reasons in modern Thailand include the opportunity for edu- 
cation at one of the two Buddhist universities and the chance, par- 
ticularly for monks of rural origin, to gain social status. 

Thai villagers expect monks to be pious and to adhere to the 
rules. Beyond that, monks are expected to provide services to in- 
dividual members of the laity and local communities by perform- 
ing various ceremonies and chanting appropriate passages from 
the Buddhist scriptures on important occasions. The presence of 
monks is believed to result in the accrual of merit to lay participants. 

Thai Buddhists generally do not expect monks to be directly 
involved in the working world; the monks' sustenance is provided 
by the members of the community in which the monks live. Their 
contribution to community life, besides their religious and 
ceremonial functions, is primarily educational. Beginning in the 
late 1960s, the government encouraged monks to engage in mis- 
sionary activity in the remote, less developed provinces, particu- 
larly among the hill peoples, as part of the effort to integrate these 
groups into the polity. Leaders at the Buddhist universities have 
taken the stand that monks owe something to society in return for 
the support given them and that, in addition to the advanced study 
of Buddhism, the universities ought to include secular subjects con- 
ducive to the enrichment of the nation. 

Buddhism, Politics, and Values 

The organizational links between the sangha and the government 
are an indication of their interdependence, although the fine points 
of that relationship may have changed over time. The traditional 
interdependence was between religion and the monarchy. The king 
was, in theory, a righteous ruler, a bodhisattva (an enlightened 
being who, out of compassion, foregoes nirvana in order to aid 



104 



Thailand: A Country Study 



others), and the protector of the religion. Because succession to 
the throne was problematic and the position of any king in many 
respects unstable, each ruler sought legitimation from the sangha. 
In return, he offered the religion his support. 

After the king became a constitutional monarch in 1932, actual 
power lay in the hands of the elites, primarily the military but also 
the higher levels of the bureaucracy. Regardless of the political com- 
plexion of the specific persons in power (who, more often than not, 
had rightist views), the significance of Buddhism to the nation was 
never attacked. In the late 1980s, the king remained an important 
symbol, and public ideology insisted that religion, king, and na- 
tion were inextricably intertwined (see The Central Government, 
ch. 4). Opposition groups have rarely attacked this set of related 
symbols. Some observers have argued that the acceptance of 
religion, king, and nation as ultimate symbols of Thai political 
values was misleading in that the great bulk of the population — 
the Thai villagers — although attached to Buddhism and respectful 
of the king, often resented the particular manifestations of govern- 
ment in local communities and situations. It seemed, however, that 
whatever discontent there was with the political, social, and eco- 
nomic orders, most Thai remained at least passively committed 
to a national identity symbolized by the king and Buddhism. 

Puey Ungphakorn, a former rector of Thammasat University 
and human rights advocate, viewed the ethical precepts of Bud- 
dhism as insurance against oppressive national development. 
Although the fundamental role of development was to improve the 
welfare of the villagers, in a number of nations without the protec- 
tion of religion the rights of the villager were often abused. In 
Thailand, according to Puey, the peasant, like the urban dweller, 
has an individual identity protected by the shared belief in 
Buddhism. 

The support given the king (and whatever political regime was 
in power) by the sangha was coupled with a prohibition on the direct 
intervention of monks in politics, particularly in party, political, 
and ideological conflicts. It was taken for granted that members 
of the sangha would oppose a communist regime, and available evi- 
dence suggested that virtually all Thai monks found Marxist thought 
alien, although monks elsewhere in Southeast Asia have been in- 
fluenced by socialist, if not explicitly communist, ideas. Histori- 
cally, monks occasionally have been involved in politics, but this 
involvement was not the norm. In the second half of the twentieth 
century, however, monks became aware of the political and ideo- 
logical ferment in Southeast Asia and in a few cases engaged in 
political propaganda, if not in direct action. A few were accused 



106 



The Society and Its Environment 

of doing so from a position on the left, but the most explicit instance 
of political propaganda in the 1970s was that of a highly influen- 
tial monk, Kittivuddha Bikkhu, who preached that it was meritori- 
ous to kill communists. Although not supported by the religious 
and political establishments, he provided right-wing militants with 
a Buddhist ideological justification for their extremist activities. 

Religious Minorities 

Defining Thai minority religions was as complex as defining Thai 
ethnic minorities. This problem was further compounded by the 
number of Thai whose Buddhism was a combination of differing 
beliefs. In the 1980s, the religious affiliation of the Chinese minority 
was particularly difficult to identify. Some adopted the Theravada 
beliefs of the Thai, and many participated in the activities of the 
local wat. Most Chinese, however, consciously retained the mix- 
ture of Confucian social ethics, formal veneration of ancestors, 
Mahayana Buddhist doctrine, and Taoist supernaturalism that was 
characteristic of the popular religious tradition in China. To the 
Chinese community as a whole, neither organized religion nor the- 
ological speculation had strong appeal. There were some Chinese 
members of the sangha, and most large Chinese temples had active 
lay associations attached to them. It was estimated in the 1980s 
that there were about twenty-one Chinese monasteries and thir- 
teen major Vietnamese monasteries in Thailand. 

The practice of Islam in the 1980s was concentrated in Thailand's 
southernmost provinces, where the vast majority of the country's 
Muslims, predominantiy Malay in origin, were found. The remain- 
ing Muslims were Pakistani immigrants in the urban centers, eth- 
nic Thai in the rural areas of the Center, and a few Chinese Muslims 
in the far north. Education and maintenance of their own cultural 
traditions were vital interests of these groups. 

Except in the small circle of theologically trained believers, the 
Islamic faith in Thailand, like Buddhism, had become integrated 
with many beliefs and practices not integral to Islam. It would be 
difficult to draw a line between animistic practices indigenous to 
Malay culture that were used to drive off evil spirits and local Islamic 
ceremonies because each contained aspects of the other. In the 
mid-1980s, the country had more than 2,000 mosques in 38 Thai 
provinces, with the largest number (434) in Narathiwat Province. 
All but a very small number of the mosques were associated with 
the Sunni branch of Islam; the remainder were of the Shia branch. 
Each mosque had an imam (prayer leader), a muezzin (who issued 
the call to prayer), and perhaps other functionaries. Although the 
majority of the country's Muslims were ethnically Malay, the 



107 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Muslim community also included the Thai Muslims, who were 
either hereditary Muslims, Muslims by intermarriage, or recent 
converts; Cham Muslims originally from Cambodia; West Asians, 
including both Sunnis and Shias; South Asians, including Tamils, 
Punjabis and Bengalis; Indonesians, especially Javanese and 
Minangkabau; Thai-Malay or people of Malay ethnicity who have 
accepted many aspects of Thai language and culture, except Bud- 
dhism, and have intermarried with Thai; and Chinese Muslims, 
who were mostly Haw living in the North. 

The National Council for Muslims, consisting of at least five 
persons (all Muslims) and appointed by royal proclamation, ad- 
vised the ministries of education and interior on Islamic matters. 
Its presiding officer, the state counselor for Muslim affairs, was 
appointed by the king and held the office of division chief in the 
Department of Religious Affairs in the Ministry of Education. 
Provincial councils for Muslim affairs existed in the provinces that 
had substantial Muslim minorities, and there were other links be- 
tween the government and the Muslim community, including 
government financial assistance to Islamic education institutions, 
assistance with construction of some of the larger mosques, and 
the funding of pilgrimages by Thai Muslims to Mecca. Thailand 
also maintained several hundred Islamic schools at the primary and 
secondary levels. 

During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Portuguese and 
Spanish Dominicans and other missionaries introduced Christianity 
to Siam. Christian missions have had only modest success in win- 
ning converts among the Thai, and the Christian community, esti- 
mated at 260,000 in the 1980s, was proportionately the smallest 
in any Asian country. The missions played an important role, 
however, as agents for the transmission of Western ideas to the 
Thai. Missionaries opened hospitals, introduced Western medical 
knowledge, and sponsored some excellent private elementary and 
secondary schools. Many of the Thai urban elite who planned to 
have their children complete their studies in European or North 
American universities sent them first to the mission-sponsored 
schools. 

A high percentage of the Christian community was Chinese, 
although there were several Lao and Vietnamese Roman Catho- 
lic communities, the latter in southeastern Thailand. About half 
the total Christian population lived in the Center. The remainder 
were located in almost equal numbers in the North and Northeast. 
More than half the total Christian community in Thailand was 
Roman Catholic. Some of the Protestant groups had banded 
together in the mid- 1930s to form the Church of Christ in Thailand, 



108 



The Society and Its Environment 



and nearly half of the more than 300 Protestant congregations in 
the country were part of that association. 

Other religions represented in Thailand included Hinduism and 
Sikhism, both associated with small ethnic groups of Indian ori- 
gin. Most of the Hindus and Sikhs lived in Bangkok. 

Education and the Arts 

In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, United 
States and British missionaries introduced formal European edu- 
cation, primarily in the palaces. Up to that time, scholarly pur- 
suits had been confined largely to Buddhist temples, where monastic 
instruction, much of it entailing the memorization of scriptures, 
was provided to boys and young men. Like his father Mongkut, 
King Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 1868-1910) wanted to integrate 
monastic instruction with Western education. Unsuccessful in this 
effort, he appointed his half brother, Prince Damrong Rajanub- 
hab, to design a new system of education. Western teachers were 
engaged to provide assistance, and in 1921 a compulsory educa- 
tion law was enacted. In 1917 the first university in the country, 
Chulalongkorn University, was established. 

Emphasis on education grew after the 1932 coup as a result of 
the new constitutional requirement for a literate populace able to 
participate in electoral politics. Government efforts focused on 
primary education; private schools, concentrated in Bangkok and 
a few provincial centers, supported a major share of educational 
activity, especially at the secondary level. Despite ambitious plan- 
ning, little was accomplished. Even after World War II, the edu- 
cated segment of Thai society continued to consist mainly of a small 
elite in Bangkok. The postwar years showed the influence of Ameri- 
can education. By the mid-1980s, perhaps as many as 100,000 Thai 
students had studied in the United States, and tens of thousands 
had benefited from Peace Corps and other United States govern- 
ment educational assistance projects. 

Only 4 million children were enrolled in government schools in 
the 1960s, but by the late 1980s nearly 80 percent of the popula- 
tion above the age of 11 had some formal education. This dramatic 
change reflected government interest in accelerating the pace of 
social development through education, especially in less secure areas 
of the country, as a means of promoting political stability. By 1983 
an estimated 99.4 percent of the children between the ages of 7 
and 12 attended primary school. (Compulsory schooling lasted only 
until grade six.) Adult literacy reportedly was more than 85.5 
percent in the mid-1980s, compared with about 50 percent in the 
1950s. Substantial public investment and foreign assistance made 



109 



Thailand: A Country Study 

significant gains possible in literacy and school enrollments (see 
table 4, Appendix). 

The government operated schools in all parts of the country, but 
there were many private schools as well, chiefly in Bangkok, spon- 
sored principally by missionaries or Chinese communal organiza- 
tions. Several universities ran what were effectively their own 
preparatory academies. In the late 1970s, the schools were reor- 
ganized into a, six-three- three pattern that comprised six years of 
primary schooling, three years of lower secondary education, and 
three years at the upper secondary level. 

Students in the upper secondary program could choose either 
academic or vocational courses. A core curriculum was common 
to both tracks, but the academic program focused on preparation 
for university entrance, whereas the vocational program empha- 
sized skilled trades and agriculture. Only a small percentage of stu- 
dents continued their education beyond secondary school. Some 
who would have chosen to do so failed to qualify for university 
acceptance. Secondary- school graduates often had difficulty find- 
ing suitable employment. Even vocational graduates in rural areas 
frequently found their industrial skills poorly fitted to the agro- 
economic job market. 

Access to education and the quality of education varied signifi- 
cantly by region. At the primary level, rural schools, administered 
since 1963 by the Ministry of Interior, tended to have the least 
qualified teachers and the most serious shortage of teaching mate- 
rials. In an effort to increase the number of teachers, other minis- 
tries, including the Ministry of Defense, offered teacher-training 
programs. Although more students gained access to education, this 
arrangement led to a duplication of resources. Competition began 
to replace cooperation among some of the teachers' colleges and 
universities. Opportunities for secondary education were concen- 
trated in major towns and in the Center. In the mid-1970s, Bang- 
kok, with 10 percent of the country's population, had 45 percent 
of the secondary- school population, while the North and the North- 
east combined, with 55 percent of the nation's population, had only 
26 percent of these students. The government has since attempted 
to rectify these inequities by improving administrative structure, 
making education more relevant to socioeconomic development, 
and adding qualitative and quantitative support to both public and 
private systems. Nevertheless, in the late 1980s the underlying 
problem of inequitable distribution of funds between the Center 
and the outlying provinces remained. 

The Office of University Affairs administered higher education 
at government universities (except for teachers' colleges, military 



110 



Bangkok schoolchildren participating in 
Boy Scouts and Girl Guides program 
Courtesy United Nations 

academies, and the two Buddhist universities) and supervised higher 
education in private colleges. By the late 1980s, the country had 
13 public universities, 3 institutes, and about 10 private colleges, 
the latter accounting for only about 7 percent of total university 
enrollment. A Western education was highly valued, and those who 
could afford to study abroad often did. Chulalongkorn University 
was the leading domestic university. Until the establishment of 
Ramkhamhaeng University in 1971 , Chulalongkorn had the larg- 
est student body (18,000 full-time and part-time students in 1987). 
Thammasat University (11,000 student population in 1987) ranked 
next in academic quality. Operations at Thammasat suffered some- 
what from punitive measures imposed after the massive student 
disorders of October 1973 (see Thailand in Transition, ch. 1). 
Thereafter, Mahidol University (formerly the University of Med- 
ical Sciences), which had nearly 9,000 students in 1987, began to 
overtake Thammasat University as Thailand's second-best univer- 
sity. Another respected academic institution was the agricultural 
university, Kasetsart University, which in 1987 had 11,000 stu- 
dents. All the major universities were located in Bangkok. The var- 
ious provincial universities, which were established in the 1960s 
and the 1970s, and a number of specialized academies, some of 
them in Bangkok, mostly had small student populations. Chiang 



111 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Mai University, founded in 1964, however, had 13,000 students 
by 1987. 

Pressure from a society that increasingly valued career-oriented 
education was in part responsible for the government's establish- 
ment of two "open universities," beginning in 1971. Both open 
universities were established for those who could not be accom- 
modated by the older institutions of higher learning, and each 
admitted secondary school graduates without any competitive 
examination. Ramkhamhaeng University conducted classes, 
whereas Sukhothai Thammathirat University offered its courses 
via national radio and television broadcasts and by correspondence. 
In 1987 Ramkhamhaeng had more than 400,000 students enrolled 
and Sukhothai Thammathirat more than 150,000. 

To maintain its own language and script, Thailand constantly 
promoted reading through both formal and informal education. 
Thailand had one of the highest levels of functional literacy in Asia 
as well as one of the largest publishing rates per person of any 
developing nation. In 1982 there were 5,645 titles published, more 
than 7 million radio receivers, 830,000 televisions, 69 daily news- 
papers, and 175 periodicals. Thai-language paperbacks, often trans- 
lations of English-language best-sellers or "how to" books, had 
a wide audience. The publishing house of Kled Thai, with 60 per- 
cent of the national market, distributed between 80,000 and 120,000 
volumes monthly. 

Thailand had a long history of written literature dating back to 
the thirteenth century, when much of the literature written in poetic 
style was religious or related to the monarchy. Examples include 
the Maha Chat Kham Luang, an epic adapted from the Buddhist 
Jataka tales, and Kotmai Tra Sam Duang, a legal work on Buddhist 
ethics. Beginning with the Chakkri Dynasty in the late eighteenth 
century, writing for both the court and the public flourished. New 
trends in literary style included Phra Aphai Mani, by Thailand's 
greatest poet Sunthon Phu (1786-1855), the written version of the 
popular epic romance poem called Khun Chang Khun Phaen, and 
Sang Thong, attributed to King Loet La (Rama II, 1809-24). Dy- 
nastic chronicles and poetry usually were dominant until the twen- 
tieth century, when King Vajiravudh (Rama VI, 1910-25) helped 
foster the birth of the modern Thai novel. Modern life was the theme 
of books such as Phudi (The Genteel) by Dotmai Sot (1905-63) or 
Songkhram Chiwit (The War of Life) by social realist Si Burapha 
(1905-74). Specific social ills, such as inadequate education, were 
documented in Khammaan Khonkhai's Khru Ban Nok, translated 
by Genhan Wijeyeaardene as The Teachers of Mad Dog 



112 



The Society and Its Environment 



Swamp, or in the revolutionary writings of Chit Phumisak and the 
progressive poetry of Naovarat Pongpaiboon. 

The modern period in Thai art began with the breakdown of 
the traditional patterns of society following the 1932 coup. A strong 
artistic influence in the modern period was exerted by the work 
of Silpa Bhirasri, an Italian-born professor. American culture also 
influenced modern Thai art forms both through Thai artists study- 
ing in the United States and through the popularity of Hollywood 
movies. Modern artists such as Kamol Tassananchalee have 
integrated American ideas into Thai art, just as centuries before 
the artists of Sukhothai and Ayutthaya applied Indian or Khmer 
concepts to Thai design. 

The Thai motion picture industry's first film was made by a 
younger brother of King Chulalongkorn in 1900. By the late 1980s, 
some 3,000 feature films had been produced and a National Film 
Archives established. Although a few of these films, such as Tong 
Pha Luang (Yellow Sky, 1980) and Sut Thon Nun (End of the Road, 
1985), were well known outside Thailand, the language barrier 
rather than their quality or relevance limited their distribution 
internationally. 

In theater in the 1980s, Thailand produced khon (classical masked 
drama) based on epics such as the Indian Ramayana (Ramakian in 
Thai), as well as more modern plays. Drama, like books, movies, 
and art, has moved out of the royal palaces within the last century 
to be enjoyed by a wider audience in a less controlled form, which 
incorporates Western elements. The Thai people accepted Western- 
ization in all areas, including the arts, on their own terms as a prag- 
matic necessity and not as something imposed by foreigners. For 
example, modern techniques in set and costume designs, makeup, 
lighting, sound systems, and theater construction were combined 
with traditional drama such as the khon. Thai monarchs beginning 
with King Mongkut initiated and led this modernization. King 
Bhumibol not only continued this movement but also widened its 
scope in an effort to make regional art forms an integral part of 
the Thai national identity. 

Health and Welfare 

By Asian standards, the level of public health in Thailand was 
relatively good. In 1986 the life expectancy for men was 61 years; 
for women it was 65 years. In 1960 for both sexes life expectancy 
had been only 51 years. In 1984 deaths among children under age 
4 averaged 4 per 1,000, while infant mortality for the same year 
was 47.7 per 1,000. The crude death rate for the population as 
a whole declined fairly consistently between 1920 and 1984, from 



113 



Thailand: A Country Study 

31.3 to 7.7 per 1,000. Much of the decline was a reflection of the 
successful struggle against malaria, which once had been the sin- 
gle greatest cause of illness and death. The expansion of the pub- 
lic health system in general, however, was also an undeniable factor 
in the improved health picture. 

Health and related social welfare services received an allocation 
of 10.3 percent of the total 1984 budget. Of this amount, about 
50 percent was assigned to public health activities; the remainder 
went to social security and welfare, housing, and community ser- 
vices. Although a disproportionate number of health care facilities 
were concentrated in the Bangkok area, Western- style medical treat- 
ment was provided throughout the country by a network of hospi- 
tals, regional health centers, and other clinics. In 1981 there were 
359 hospitals, with 1 bed per 734 people and 1 physician per 6,951 
people. In the same year, the nation registered 1,142 dentists and 
more than 50,000 nurses and midwives. 

Despite progress in lengthening life expectancy, combating dis- 
ease, and building public health facilities, Thailand in the late 1980s 
faced a bleak public health situation. One of the most critical 
national health problems was the water supply. In the mid-1970s, 
little more than 20 percent of the population, most of that portion 
being urban dwellers, was reported to have access to safe water. 
Even in Bangkok, where the proportion with such access was 
highest, only about 60 percent of the population had access to pota- 
ble public water. In the countryside, inhabitants depended on shal- 
low wells, roof drainage, rivers, and canals. 

Throughout Thailand, but especially in Bangkok, the traditional 
skyline with its Buddhist temples was becoming overshadowed by 
We stern- style buildings and skyscrapers. Construction was done 
mostly by laborers who usually lived on site with their families. 
In 1980 there were more than 373,000 construction workers (79 
percent of whom had once been farmers) living in temporary hous- 
ing, which typically measured only 3 to 4 meters square and had 
a door but no windows. Workers' compensation and paid sick leave 
were almost nonexistent, and illness and inadequate sanitation were 
common in these shantytowns. Although public and private agen- 
cies were becoming aware of the seriousness of the problem from 
both a health and a legal point of view, the transient nature of the 
burgeoning construction community made this population difficult 
to serve. In the urban areas, modern development and outward 
prosperity often masked deficiencies in basic infrastructure that 
arose from rapid and unplanned growth. Urban planners were con- 
fronted with traffic congestion, housing shortages, and air, water, 
and noise pollution. 



114 



The Society and Its Environment 



The development of an international consumer economy brought 
new challenges and Western diseases, particularly for urban 
dwellers. Prostitution and narcotics use, which had been part of 
Thai culture for centuries, took on new dimensions as health haz- 
ards. With the worldwide spread of acquired immune deficiency 
syndrome (AIDS) and new strains of venereal diseases, Thailand 
became concerned about the welfare of its female citizens and the 
effects on tourism. By mid- 1987 eleven people in Thailand were 
reported to have AIDS and about another eighty to be AIDS car- 
riers. The government had begun to take such action as testing 
homosexuals and drug addicts for AIDS, testing donated blood sup- 
plies, sponsoring public information campaigns, and funding the 
development of an inexpensive AIDS testing kit by Mahidol 
University. 

In the mid-nineteenth century, narcotics were seen as a domes- 
tic problem, but one limited mostly to the Chinese. By the 1960s, 
drug use was considered a security or a foreign affairs issue. Only 
by the late 1970s did Thailand recognize drugs as a growing domes- 
tic problem. By that time, in addition to organic narcotic produc- 
tion, there was a dramatic rise in the production and use of synthetic 
drugs. Narcotics-related crimes ranked third among all types of 
criminal activity in 1983. In that year, there were 28,992 convic- 
tions for drug offenses nationally and 11,777 in Bangkok, which 
resulted in the overcrowding of prisons and detention centers. To 
combat the problem, the government instituted both public infor- 
mation campaigns and drug treatment centers. The national media 
began to make daily announcements about the social effects of drug 
use, and even in small provincial cities billboards were used to carry 
the message. Some traditional social systems were also employed 
in an innovative fashion. For example, Wat Tarn Krabok, in Sara 
Buri Province, became one of the most important centers for the 
treatment of opiate addiction. Moreover, the government responded 
to the increase in health-related problems by placing new empha- 
sis on meeting basic social needs in its economic and social develop- 
ment planning. 

The Indochinese Refugee Question 

The forced migrations of Indochinese to Thailand for political 
or economic reasons had been a common occurrence throughout 
the 200 years of the Chakkri Dynasty. The most recent refugee 
influx began in 1975 with the fall of the Lon Nol regime in Cam- 
bodia, then the collapse of the South Vietnamese government in 
April, followed by the change of leadership in Laos in December. 
According to official Thai figures, 228,200 refugees, mostly from 



115 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Laos, entered Thailand between 1975 and 1978. Included were 
Lao, Khmer, Tai Dam, Tai Nung, and Hmong, who came over- 
land, and Vietnamese, who came by boat. Fifteen camps and four 
detention centers were established and jointly funded and oper- 
ated by the Thai government, the United Nations High Commis- 
sioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and various international relief 
agencies. Most of the camps were along the border with Laos and 
Cambodia or at ports on the Gulf of Thailand. Until October 1977, 
Thai authorities generally accepted incoming Indochinese on the 
assumption that they would stay only until repatriated or relocated 
elsewhere. 

After the coup of October 1977, the new Kriangsak Chomanand 
government reviewed Thai refugee policy. As a result of the growing 
refugee burden, the Thai government made it clear that greater 
international recognition of the refugee problem was needed, as 
well as financial and technical support for Thailand's relief pro- 
gram. Citing population pressures, land shortages, and potential 
economic friction between Thai and refugees, the Thai govern- 
ment refused to permit permanent resettlement of large numbers 
of refugees. Thus, in November 1977 the government banned new 
arrivals from Laos (termed "illegals") on the basis of the determi- 
nation that these refugees were economically rather than politically 
motivated. 

The actual number of Lao in Thailand continued to be impos- 
sible to determine; in 1987 Thai authorities claimed that up to 
10,000 arrived daily, adding to an estimated 84,000 Lao refugees 
and illegals already in the Mekong Valley and border camps. Of 
the 42,000 inhabitants of Ban Vanai camp, between 3,000 and 6,000 
were illegals. These numbers were subject to rapid change because 
of government-enforced repatriation, resettlement, and voluntary 
returns. In 1987 Amnesty International expressed concern over 
the fate of 155 Hmong who presumably were forcibly repatriated 
from Thailand; they were then arrested and detained without charge 
or trial by Lao authorities. This alleged incident may have led to 
resettlement requests by at least 5,000 Hmong (there were 56,000 
in Thai camps) at the time. There was also a steady flow of per- 
sons returning to Laos on their own. 

Laotians were not the only refugees caught in the Thai repatria- 
tion policy, which vacillated between national interest and human- 
itarian concerns. In 1979 tens of thousands of people, mostly ethnic 
Chinese, began to leave Vietnam by sea; hostilities between China 
and Vietnam directly or indirectly encouraged this migration by 
boat. Ships of the Royal Thai Navy sometimes discouraged Viet- 
namese refugee craft from attempting landings; some of Thailand's 



116 




Cambodian refugee children in Thailand 
Courtesy CARE, Inc. 



117 



Thailand: A Country Study 

neighbors had been even more strict about turning away "boat 
people." Despite its relatively lenient position, Thailand was judged 
harshly by the international community as a result of reported acts 
of piracy by Thai vessels. However, because of increased vigilance 
and improvement in training of Thai maritime police in the 1980s, 
convictions for piracy increased significantly, and Thai fishermen 
began to provide greater assistance to the boat people. Nonethe- 
less, the international press continued to report acts of piracy by 
Thai citizens. 

In January 1979, Cambodia's Pol Pot regime was overthrown 
in fighting between Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge forces, and 
hundreds of thousands of destitute Cambodian civilians fled west- 
ward to the provinces of their country adjacent to the Thai border. 
Tensions built quickly along the ill-defined and disputed Thai- 
Cambodian border. It was extremely difficult for Thai police to 
mount effective patrols against illegal entry or illicit trade activi- 
ties. Smuggling by Thai citizens and foraging raids into Thailand 
by Khmer Rouge troops soon became a major source of concern. 
In June 1979, Thailand began forced repatriation of more than 
40,000 Cambodians, who were loaded into buses with a week's 
supply of food each and taken back across the border. 

In July representatives of fifty nations concerned about this forced 
repatriation met in Geneva, where they pledged increased aid and 
permanent asylum for more refugees. Under international pres- 
sure, Thailand revised its refugee policy in October 1979; although 
still considered illegal entrants, Cambodians would not automati- 
cally be intercepted but would be given every assistance possible 
as a matter of compassion. In November 1979, camps were opened 
near the border with Cambodia, and within 2 months 156,000 illegal 
immigrants were housed in them. The Thai military had assumed 
responsibility for another 149,000 Cambodians; there were also 
113,000 at Khao-I-Dang and 28,400 at Sa Kaeo. The Ministry 
of Interior was responsible for the illegal immigrants in other camps. 

Increased armed warfare along the Thai-Cambodian border dis- 
rupted the lives of the Thai citizens as well as Cambodian civilians. 
Hence, Thai military officials became more closely involved in refu- 
gee affairs and at times overruled or interfered with civilian govern- 
ment policies. Supporters of the People's Republic of Kampuchea 
occasionally staged border attacks on refugee holding centers. In 
March 1984, Cambodian civilians encamped directly across from 
the Thai province of Sisaket were attacked; because of such activi- 
ties, about 10,000 Cambodian civilians fled into Thailand. Between 
1975 and February 1987, some 211,000 Cambodians were reset- 
tled abroad; this left about 22,000 in Khao-I-Dang, near the 



118 



The Society and Its Environment 



southeastern border city of Aranyaprathet in Prachin Buri Province, 
since all other camps for Cambodians had been officially closed. 
More than 100,000 remained at various sites along the border, 
however. The possibilities for resettlement remained unclear. 

As refugees in East Africa and Central America began to receive 
more international attention in the 1980s, Thailand became increas- 
ingly concerned that the large number of Indochinese people, 
especially Cambodians, would become solely a Thai problem in- 
stead of an international one. In 1987 the Thai government offi- 
cially closed the Khao-I-Dang holding center, in part to refocus 
international attention on the issue of Indochinese refugees. In an- 
nouncing the closing of Khao-I-Dang, Prasong Soonsiri, secretary 
general to Thailand's prime minister, stated, among other reasons, 
that these camps in Thailand had created a "pull factor" that had 
encouraged more Cambodians to cross the border. Asked about 
the border people's fate, a high official of a Cambodian resistance 
group answered in December 1986 that "the camps [are] closed 
but not closed." 

The Thai government stated that as of February 1 986 there were 
still 127,817 Indochinese refugees in Thai holding and processing 
centers, while some 500,000 refugees had been resettled in third 
countries. After 1981 the rate of resettlement declined sharply; for 
example, only 33,090 people were resettled in 1982, a drop of about 
two-thirds from the 102,564 resettled in 1981. Thai authorities had 
become concerned not only that international attention had 
decreased but also that the decline in third-country resettlement 
would continue because of more selective criteria and more strin- 
gent procedures for screening and accepting candidates for reset- 
tlement. People had always moved across natural and artificially 
imposed borders in Indochina for economic and political reasons, 
but between 1975 and 1980 about 1.3 million people were displaced 
by the Second Indochina War and its aftermath. Because of its com- 
mon borders with Laos and Cambodia, Thailand had shouldered 
the burden of a great number of these refugees who sought first 
asylum there. The flow of refugees after 1980 decreased little, but 
the numbers who found permanent homes did. In the late 1980s, 
the Indochinese refugee crisis remained both unsolved and a fac- 
tor of growing importance in understanding late twentieth-century 
Thai society. 

The burden of sheltering, even temporarily, several hundred 
thousand refugees placed stresses on social services already stretched 
thin by rapid urbanization. The more serious prospect of having 
permanently to assimilate large numbers of refugees was an even 
greater worry for Thai officials and the society as a whole. It was 



119 



Thailand: A Country Study 

not a new problem, however, for a nation composed as Thailand 
was of many ethnic groups whose ancestors down through the cen- 
turies had sought refuge in the region of the Chao Phraya Valley. 

* * * 

American, British, Thai, and other scholars have carried out 
research on Thailand's rural communities since the late 1940s. 
These studies are marked by varying perspectives and different, 
sometimes contradictory, emphases. From the end of World War 
II until the 1970s, Americans were the leaders in Thai studies. This 
dominance has ended, however, because of the dramatic improve- 
ment in education in Thailand and the increased involvement of 
the scholars of other countries, such as Australia. In the late 1980s, 
excellent studies in both English and Thai were being produced 
by Thammasat University's Thai Khadi Research Institute and 
Chulalongkorn University's Institute of Asian Studies. The Study 
of Thailand, edited by Eliezer B. Ayal, presents a historical review 
of works relating to Thai studies. 

Thailand in the 80s, published by the National Identity Office of 
the Office of the Prime Minister of Thailand, presents a compre- 
hensive overview of Thailand with an economic and social orien- 
tation. An examination of changes in Thai society, polity, and 
culture since World War II is presented in Charles F. Keyes's 
Thailand: Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State. A more histori- 
cal approach is presented in David K. Wyatt's Thailand: A Short 
History. The Thai political framework is addressed by John L.S. 
Girling in Thailand: Society and Politics. Several texts have been writ- 
ten on Thailand's physical setting and population; the most com- 
prehensive of those was Wolf Donner's The Five Faces of Thailand. 
In the Thai context, it is best to accept the melding of society and 
religion; true to this blending is Japanese scholar Yoneo Ishii's San- 
gha, State, and Society. Wyatt's The Politics of Reform in Thailand still 
stands as the preeminent work on Thai education, but a number 
of new works on Thai literature have been published. Most recently, 
Herbert P. Phillips's Modern Thai Literature and Wibha Senanan's 
The Genesis of the Novel in Thailand provide a good overview of 
twentieth-century thought through the medium of literature. For 
a wider perspective on Thai art and culture, Facets of Thai Cultural 
Life, published by the Office of the Prime Minister in 1984, is use- 
ful. (For further information and complete citations, see Bib- 
liography.) 



120 



Chapter 3. The Economy 



Floating market scene along a bustling khlong (canal) in the old capital city 
of Thon Buri, across the river from Bangkok 



THE THAI ECONOMY of the 1980s continued to function much 
along the open market lines that had traditionally characterized 
it. It remained capitalist in orientation, largely operated by the pri- 
vate sector with supportive infrastructure furnished by the govern- 
ment, which had some participation in production and commerce 
through a limited number of state-owned enterprises. Commitment 
to the existing economic system appeared general — none of the 
numerous Thai governments of the post- World War II years had 
advocated significant changes. 

In the 1960s and 1970s, Thailand was among the fastest grow- 
ing and most successful developing countries in the world. Rapid 
growth in production, accompanied by progress in alleviating 
poverty, was impressive, especially in the 1970s. By the early 1980s, 
however, Thailand's economic performance had slowed, partly as 
a result of the worldwide recession. Although its annual growth 
rate remained higher than the average for middle-income coun- 
tries, earlier expectations had not been met. The targets of the Fifth 
Economic Development Plan (1982-86) had not been achieved, 
and serious macroeconomic imbalances persisted. 

The government sought balanced economic growth and the clos- 
ing of the income gap, along with improvement of the inequitable 
distribution of social services. Social and economic trends included 
increasing urbanization, expansion of industrial activities at a faster 
rate than agriculture, and growth of income in the service indus- 
tries. These trends, often associated with modernization, produced 
problems with which the government tried to cope. Bangkok con- 
tinued to face serious housing shortages and severe pressure on such 
basic services as water, sewerage, energy, and transport facilities. 
Although agriculture had been the most important economic ac- 
tivity of the country with most of the population living in the rural 
areas, the area of land under cultivation was unlikely to increase. 
Rather, it was projected that any increase in income would have 
to be gained through higher productivity of the labor and land now 
in use and by the development and diversification of industrial 
production. Accordingly, the government promoted enterprises that 
produced agricultural products, chemicals, and mechanical and elec- 
tronic equipment and those that were labor intensive or export 
oriented. 

Because foreign trade and investment were an important part 
of the economy, external conditions greatly influenced the country's 



123 



Thailand: A Country Study 

economic performance. Thailand's harvests exceeded domestic con- 
sumption, enabling the country to export large quantities of food 
each year. The major agricultural exports were rice, cassava 
products, rubber, maize, and sugar; the major nonagricultural 
exports were textiles, electronics, and tin. Imports included more 
than half the country's national petroleum consumption. Although 
Thailand was a member of the Association of Southeast Asian 
Nations (ASEAN) with preferential trading arrangements, its prin- 
cipal trading partners were Japan, the United States, countries of 
the European Economic Community (EEC), and Australia. 

Long-term prospects depended greatly on the effects of interna- 
tional economic conditions on the Thai economy. In the late 1970s 
and early 1980s, rising interest rates, declining demand and prices 
for Thai exports, and rising petroleum prices had caused a serious 
economic slump. Further growth of the economy depended, in part, 
on the success of the Thai government in improving economic effi- 
ciency and increasing domestic savings through development 
planning. 

Economic and Financial Development 

In the 1960s and 1970s, the country's abundant natural resources, 
an enterprising and competitive private sector, and cautious and 
pragmatic economic management resulted in the emergence of one 
of the fastest growing and most successful economies among the 
developing countries. Between 1960 and 1970, the country's average 
annual growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP — see Glossary) 
was 8.4 percent, compared with 5.8 percent for all middle-income, 
oil-importing countries. Between 1970 and 1980, the GDP rate of 
growth was 7.2 percent, compared with 5.6 percent for the middle- 
income oil-importing countries. The world slowdown by the late 
1970s was mainly caused by the rise in oil prices. The Thai GDP 
in 1982 was US$36.7 billion. It rose to US$42 billion in 1985 (see 
table 5, Appendix). The projected rate of growth for GDP during 
the early 1980s was around 4.3 percent as a result of falling de- 
mand and prices for Thai exports despite a drop in oil price. It 
was apparent that in the 1980s Thailand had lost its momentum; 
its Fifth Economic Development Plan targets had not been met be- 
cause of serious macroeconomic imbalances, such as decreasing 
savings and investment rates, increasing budget deficits, and in- 
creasing debt and debt- servicing obligations. Whether Thailand 
could regain its former momentum depended on the success of its 
Sixth Economic Development Plan (1987-91). 

Between 1970 and 1980, investment represented on the aver- 
age 25.2 percent of GDP, compared with 24.7 percent by the 



124 



The Economy 



mid-1980s. This proportion was one of the lowest investment rates 
in Southeast Asia. The national savings rate had fallen even more, 
from an average of 22 percent during the 1970s to around 17.8 
percent by the mid-1980s. Hence, the average current-account 
deficit of 7 percent of GDP during the early 1980s had been caused 
by a declining savings rate rather than by an increase in invest- 
ment rate. This imbalance was more serious than one caused by 
rising investment because rising investment could pay for itself with 
increased output and, possibly, increased savings so that debt could 
be repaid. With falling savings, foreign borrowing was used not 
to raise investment but merely to fill the investment- savings gap, 
which was mirrored in the external debt ratio of 39 percent of GDP 
and 146 percent of exports by the mid-1980s. The total debt ser- 
vice ratio went up from 17.3 percent in 1980 to more than 25 per- 
cent by the mid-1980s. The increase was an important factor in 
the decision of the government to sharply reduce authorization for 
new commitments of public debt. 

Public Finance 

By the mid-1980s, government revenues averaged around 14 per- 
cent of GDP and consumption averaged around 13 percent, leav- 
ing a public savings net of interest payments of 1 percent of GDP. 
This was low compared with an average savings of 7 percent for 
the lower middle-income countries and 10 percent for the upper 
middle-income countries. 

The financing of public expenditures caused a major imbalance 
because of high deficit and low public savings. Although not a new 
problem, increases in public expenditure needed to be matched by 
increases in revenues. Efforts were made to tackle the problem, 
and the public capital expenditures annual growth rate had dropped 
from 64.7 percent in 1980 to 8.5 percent in 1982 and 7.4 percent 
by the mid-1980s. The problem remained serious, however, be- 
cause of political unwillingness to raise public revenue to the re- 
quired level. In fact, the central government managed to finance 
only its public current expenditures with its revenues. Almost all 
capital expenditures, which averaged around 3.5 percent of GDP 
by the mid-1980s, were financed with borrowed funds, and often 
even some of the current expenditures had been financed with bor- 
rowed funds, thus increasing the debt-servicing burden. 

Total revenue averaged around 13 percent of GDP in the 1970s 
and remained at the same level in the mid-1980s. In view of the 
disappointing revenue level, a new tax package was instituted in 
1984-85 to raise revenues, including an increase in the tax rates 
on interest earnings from 10 percent to 12.5 percent, a reduction 



125 



Thailand: A Country Study 

in the standard deduction for self-employed persons, the introduc- 
tion of an estate tax, the abolition of preferential rates for compa- 
nies listed on the stock exchange, the abolition of tax exemptions 
for selected state enterprises, streamlined exemptions and deduc- 
tions for business taxes, and other measures. The resulting gains 
in revenue were, however, partially offset by measures to simplify 
the personal and corporate tax system. No effort had been made 
to reduce legal exemptions and illegal evasions. The net revenue 
effect of the package was therefore negligible. 

Some experts concluded that a broader tax base, less compli- 
cated tax structure, and lower tax rates needed to be considered 
in the tax reform. Also, contributions and taxes paid by the state- 
owned enterprises should be increased because they had dropped 
from 41 percent of profit in the late 1970s to only 23 percent by 
the mid-1980s. 

The Ministry of Finance required state enterprises to make spe- 
cific improvements in their financial condition as a prerequisite 
for obtaining guarantees for borrowing. The measures included 
financing 25 percent of new investment from the state enterprises' 
own resources, forwarding at least 30 percent of their profits to 
the treasury, privatizing commercial enterprises, introducing 
corporate-planning systems, and limiting debt financing. Such mea- 
sures did not lessen the burden of state enterprises on the budget, 
and their capital expenditure financed by the government had stayed 
at the same average annual rate of 3.5 percent of GDP in the 1970s 
and mid-1980s. It was noteworthy, however, that their performance 
had improved, with savings rising from 0.2 percent of GDP dur- 
ing the Fourth Economic Development Plan period (1977-81) to 
1.4 percent of GDP by the mid-1980s. 

With approximately 68 state-owned enterprises, Thailand had 
fewer than the average in other Southeast Asian countries, such 
as the Philippines, with 264. Nevertheless, the government was 
very concerned with their performance. The largest ones in terms 
of assets were in public utilities, transport and communication, 
financial institutions, and petroleum. The smaller ones were in 
manufacturing, agriculture, commerce, and services. The state en- 
terprises did not represent the entire extent of public ownership 
in the economy; in the mid-1980s, the government received 75 per- 
cent of the shares of 24 troubled finance companies in order to rescue 
them from bankruptcy. In addition, the Ministry of Finance held 
minority shares in eighty-eight other private firms. All state en- 
terprises were attached to a parent ministry or to the Office of the 
Prime Minister, and there were five core agencies and two com- 
mittees to supervise their activities. Some experts suggested that, 



126 



Open-air market in Bangkok 
Courtesy United Nations 

in order to improve the efficiency of state enterprises, the enter- 
prises needed to be more decentralized and exposed to free mar- 
ket competition. 

The government spent approximately US$16 billion during the 
period from 1982 to 1985 (see table 6, Appendix). In real terms, 
this represented an increase of about 52 percent over public ex- 
penditures from 1977 to 1981, the fourth plan period. Because an 
increasing percentage of the budget was devoted to recurring obli- 
gations, fewer funds were available for capital investment. Close 
to 70 percent of current expenditure was used for wages, salaries, 
interest costs, and defense. Investment in energy, transport, and 
communication had taken nearly 64 percent of total capital expen- 
diture by the mid-1980s. Agriculture received a fairly constant 
proportion of about 15 percent of total public capital expenditure, 
and industry dropped from 1.3 percent to 0.9 percent between the 
end of the 1970s and the mid-1980s. Education, health, and wel- 
fare together continued to receive about 12 percent throughout the 
same period. 

Money and Banking 

Thailand's performance in managing its money and banking 
affairs through successful development and diversification of its 
financial institutions was impressive in the 1960s and 1970s. 



127 



Thailand: A Country Study 

However, economic imbalances in the early 1980s and the rising 
tendency of governmental intervention put the financial sector under 
stress, thus reducing its efficiency in resource mobilization and 
allocation. Efforts to remedy the economic imbalances in the Fifth 
Economic Development Plan included restructuring monetary, 
exchange rate, and interest rate policies; strengthening the open 
securities market; and encouraging competition among financial 
institutions. 

Financial Institutions 

Thailand had many types of financial institutions, subject to 
different laws and regulated by different agencies. Most of them 
were privately owned, but some were state owned. The primary 
state-owned facility was the Bank of Thailand, which had respon- 
sibility and authority for monetary control in its role as the central 
bank. It served as the fiscal agent and the financier of the govern- 
ment; regulated the money supply, foreign exchange, and the bank- 
ing system; and also served as the lender of last resort to the banks. 
Other state-owned facilities included the Government Savings Bank, 
the Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives, the 
Industrial Finance Corporation of Thailand, the Government Hous- 
ing Bank, and the Small Industry Finance Corporation of Thailand. 

By the mid-1980s, the 30 commercial banks had 1,526 branches 
handling the majority of all financial transactions in Thailand. The 
16 largest banks accounted for over 90 percent of assets, deposits, 
and loans of the commercial banks, indicating a high concentra- 
tion and little competition in the banking industry. Moreover, 
despite the impressive growth of banks, entrance by new banks was 
limited. 

Finance and security companies comprised the second largest 
group of financial institutions with assets equaling nearly 22 per- 
cent of those of commercial banks. Concentration also existed in 
the securities industry, the 5 largest companies (out of 112) hold- 
ing 19 percent of all finance and security assets. The finance com- 
panies were created by many domestic and foreign banks to 
overcome banking restrictions. Although they were intended to 
increase competition with commercial banks, the objective was not 
met because many banks used the companies as an extension of 
their own activities. 

Money and Capital Markets 

The money and capital markets were still underdeveloped in 
the mid-1980s. One striking fact was that the money market was 
very rudimentary and there was practically no open market for 



128 



The Economy 



short-term securities; the only investors in treasury bills and govern- 
ment bonds were commercial banks and a few other financial 
institutions, which had to hold them until maturity. Certificates 
of deposits did not exist, and, for all intents and purposes, promis- 
sory notes issued by the finance companies were nonnegotiable. 
In order to increase the liquidity aspect of government bonds, in 
April 1979 the Bank of Thailand established the government bond 
repurchase market. In reality this was only a brokerage window 
at the central bank for institutional investors and, therefore, did 
not help to achieve the desired objective of open-market operation. 
Thus, Thai interest rates were determined, to a significant degree, 
by international forces rather than central bank sales and purchases 
of government securities. 

The Security Exchange of Thailand (SET) had combined the 
functions of securities market and securities commission, provid- 
ing the legal framework for underwriting and trading of corpora- 
tion shares of common stocks and bonds as well as government 
securities. In 1974 the SET assumed the functions of the Bangkok 
Stock Exchange, which never had been very active. In 1976 the 
SET had an upsurge because of expansionary monetary policy. 
In 1978 the SET collapsed, however, because of massive specula- 
tion, easy margin finance of up to 70 percent of a transaction, unpre- 
paredness and inexperience of the brokers as well as the investors, 
and inadequate regulation and supervision of the market and such 
activities as inside trading and manipulation. The government creat- 
ed at that time two special public funds to purchase securities in 
order to limit the negative effects of price swings in the SET. Many 
investors, however, held on to their investments that had declined 
in value in order to wait for a better price, thus decreasing normal 
stock market activity. The hesitation to trade in the market created 
a surplus problem for the SET, further damaging investor confi- 
dence. Some economists suggested that more specific regulations 
and supervisory systems were needed in order to revive the SET 
and restore public confidence. 

Rural Finance 

Beginning in the late 1960s, the government gave top priority 
to increasing credit availability to the agricultural sector despite 
the fact that agricultural performance had been excellent during 
the previous two decades. The emphasis was on providing credit 
to agriculture at below market interest rates and channeling credit 
to poor farmers. In 1975 the central bank imposed a mandatory 
credit allocation system, under which a required minimum of 5 
percent of all outstanding bank loans were allocated to agriculture. 



129 



Thailand: A Country Study 

This quota was increased to 7 percent, then 9 percent, and finally 
to 13 percent by the mid-1980s. Moreover, all new rural and provin- 
cial branches of banks were required to lend 60 percent of their 
local deposits in the area served by the branch, with one- third of 
that amount reserved for farmers. 

In 1966 the government established the Bank for Agriculture 
and Agriculture Cooperatives to supply credit for the development 
of the agricultural sector. In the 1980s, it became the most impor- 
tant single source of credit for farmers, and it had a wide coverage 
of 62 branches and 514 field units located throughout the country; 
more than 2 million farm families were reached directly and in- 
directly via the cooperatives and farmers associations. Noninstitu- 
tional sources, such as agriculture and savings cooperatives, supplied 
50 percent of agricultural credit, and commercial banks and the 
agricultural banks each supplied 25 percent. Finance for nonagricul- 
tural activities in the rural sector, which provided 50 percent of 
rural income, was largely neglected. 

Industrial Finance 

The government did not use a mandatory allocation system or 
interest controls to affect the distribution of credit among indus- 
trial subsectors or regions or classes of industrial borrowers. The 
interest rate ceiling, however, did limit credit availability to small 
and medium industrial firms. Therefore, most credit went to the 
larger firms, which were mainly engaged in import substitution 
and were concentrated in the Bangkok metropolitan area. 

Commercial banks, finance companies, and the Industrial 
Finance Corporation of Thailand (IFCT) were the main suppliers 
of credit to the industrial sector. Commercial banks accounted for 
nearly 70 percent of the total credit granted to the manufacturing 
sector by the mid-1980s, the finance companies 24 percent, and 
IFCT the rest. Although the share of the IFCT was modest, it was 
the only one that offered extensive term-financing on a project basis. 
It was a private institution, but its mandate was to grant loans for 
projects having a low financial rate of return, which were unac- 
ceptable to commercial banks but were important to the economy 
as a whole. Such loans were possible because of the government 
guaranty for liquidity assistance to small borrowers and soft-term 
loans. The activities of the IFCT were hampered, however, by its 
being limited to fixed assets financing and by the lengthy project- 
evaluation procedure. 

Finance companies tended to deal with smaller borrowers than 
did commercial banks in their lending to manufacturing firms be- 
cause they were allowed to charge higher rates to offset the higher 



130 



Umbrella- painting cottage industry in Chiang Mai 
Courtesy United Nations 

risk associated with smaller borrowers. Yet, because of the limited 
regional spread of their branch networks and their limited resources, 
they could not fill all the gaps left by commercial banks, such as 
the supply of long-term loans. 

Commercial banks provided the widest range of services. Be- 
sides credit, they offered checking services, short-term trade credits, 
guarantees for third-party borrowing, foreign exchange services, 
and letters of credit. The breakdown of bank loan portfolios showed 
19 percent for discount of trade bills, 58 percent for overdrafts, 
and 23 percent for loans. Because discounting and overdrafts were 
short-term activities, the 2 3 -percent share for loans meant that long- 
term financing was scarce relative to short-term financing. Because 
fixed assets such as land and buildings represented the preferred 
collateral for banks, smaller borrowers with fewer fixed assets tended 
to be limited in their access to loans. Once a borrower had pledged 
its assets to banks for short-term financing, it could not use the 
assets for collateral with another institution, such as the IFCT, for 
long-term loans. 

Monetary Policies 

Monetary policy was traditionally passive. Control over the 
rate of credit extension was the primary means for supporting 
growth, maintaining price stability, and monitoring the balance 



131 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of payments. Interest rates were allowed to adjust to the rate of 
credit expansion and were very much affected by international rates 
as a result of the Thai open economy. Low returns tended to dis- 
courage private savings and encourage high demand for consumer 
goods. 

Domestic prices also were largely determined by world price 
movements as a result of the country's open economy and minimal 
domestic price controls. In fact the oil price increases in the early 
1970s caused inflation to rise from 4.8 percent in 1972 to 24.3 per- 
cent in 1974. The deceleration of world prices in the early 1980s 
caused domestic inflation to decline from 13 percent in 1981 to 5 
percent in 1982. Measuring by the price indexes, with 1972 as a 
base of 100, price increase was less for agricultural products, going 
from 130.2 in 1973 to 227.7 in 1983 compared with 115.7 to 276.3 
for nonagricultural products. The highest increase among agricul- 
tural goods was for forest products, which went from 122.9 to 403.2 
during the same period. Among nonagricultural goods, mining and 
quarrying showed the highest increases. The consumer price index, 
taking 1976 as the base of 100, showed the highest increase in trans- 
portation prices with 231 .2 in 1982, while the rest of the consump- 
tion basket had an increase of about 180 between 1976 and 1982. 
The Bangkok metropolitan area had the highest increase with 194 
in 1983, compared with 188.4 for the Northeast region, 181.6 for 
the Center, 180 for the North, and 178.4 for the South (these being 
Thailand's four geographic regions). 

Employment and Wages 

The average annual rate of employment growth in the 1970s was 
2.7 percent, compared with 2.9 percent in labor force growth caused 
by rapid population growth in the 1950s and 1960s. As a result, 
unemployment reached 1.7 million in 1985, which corresponded 
to an unemployment rate of around 6.3 percent. Agriculture was 
the major employer with about 69 percent of total employment in 
the mid-1980s, a decline from 84 percent in 1960. Between 1970 
and 1983 manufacturing increased its share of the total employed 
labor force from 4.1 percent to 7.4 percent. Commerce increased 
from 1.6 percent to 8.7 percent, and services from 7 percent to 
10 percent during the same period. 

The work force had gone through some structural changes in 
terms of age and sex. The fastest growing age-group in the 1960s 
was eleven- to fourteen-year-olds. In the 1980s, that age-group 
dropped as a result of a falling birth rate in the early 1970s and 
increasing primary and secondary school enrollment. By the 
mid-1980s, the fastest growing group in the work force was aged 



132 



The Economy 



between twenty and thirty, with increasing participation by females. 
The proportion of women employed went from 66 percent in 1971 
to around 70 percent by the mid-1980s. Female employment was 
highest in commerce with 54 percent in 1979, followed by 50 per- 
cent in agriculture, 43 percent in industries, and 36 percent in 
services. 

In terms of regional distribution, the North had the lowest rate 
of labor force growth, with 3 percent between 1971 and 1985, fol- 
lowed by the Northeast, with 3.3 percent as a result of limited job 
opportunities and migration. Bangkok had the highest labor force 
growth with 6.9 percent. Regional growth of the labor force de- 
pended partly on the level of education. An increasing (although 
still small) number of new entrants in the work force had received 
a higher education. In 1971 the percentage of the total labor force 
that had an elementary education was 90.2. This figure declined 
to 72.6 percent in 1985. For people with lower and upper secon- 
dary education, the share went from 4.8 percent to 10.4 percent 
during the same period. The percentage of the labor force with 
vocational training jumped from 1.9 percent to 10.4 percent be- 
tween 1971 and 1985. Yet unemployment in Thailand for those 
with a college or vocational education rose from 8.4 to 9 percent 
by the mid-1980s, mostly because of an average increase of 13.7 
percent per year in the educated work force between 1977 and 1985. 

The real wage rate between 1978 and 1985 remained the same 
for most of the country, but in some regions, such as the North, 
it dropped from Bl .81 per hour to Bl .66 (for value of the baht — 
B — see Glossary). Only in Bangkok did wages increase — from B3.64 
to B4.20 — during the period. Real wages were stagnant because 
minimum wage adjustments were not always closely linked to in- 
flation rates, and compliance with the minimum wage laws was 
not observed by the various sectors of the economy and regions 
of the country. Minimum wage laws were first introduced in April 
1973 after the legalization of unions in 1972. At the outset, the 
laws covered only Bangkok. They were subsequently applied to 
the entire country, which was divided into three regions with three 
different scales for various types of activities; agriculture and govern- 
ment administration were exempted. By 1982 minimum wages in 
Bangkok had been raised by 100 percent; those in other regions 
had been raised by 50 to 70 percent. 

International Trade and Finance 

International Trade 

Thailand sustained a trade balance deficit from the early 1970s 
to the mid-1980s. Although the trade balance had improved during 



133 



Thailand: A Country Study 

the first part of the 1970s, it worsened after the oil shocks of 1973 
and 1979. In fact the net value of oil imports went from US$52.5 
million in 1970 to US$684.7 million in 1982, with dependence on 
foreign oil reaching 75 percent in 1980 and declining to 50 per- 
cent by 1985. Although there was a general decline in the export 
performance of developing countries in the early 1980s, Thailand's 
recovery from the oil shock was further delayed by a loss in export 
competitiveness, a slowdown in the economies of major trading 
partners, and a growing debt service obligation resulting in part 
from rising interest rates. The current account balance deficits were 
not as severe as the trade deficits as a result of improving service 
balances. By 1986 the balance of payments had moved into sur- 
plus on current account (see table 7, Appendix). The major con- 
tribution to the service balance surplus was tourism, which increased 
from 630,000 tourists in 1970 to 2.6 million in 1986. Tourism was 
the top foreign exchange earner from 1981 to 1986. The trade deficit 
was caused in part by a decreasing growth rate of exports between 
1980 and 1983, which improved slightly by 1985. The growth rate 
of imports also declined, but at a slower rate. Despite an increase 
in tourism, the trade deficit reached a peak in 1983 of US$3.9 bil- 
lion. In 1985 exports totaled US$7.1 billion and imports US$9.2 
billion, leaving an unfavorable trade balance of US$2.1 billion. 
By 1986 the deficit had decreased even further, with some of the 
reduction a result of the lower cost of imported oil. 

The composition or structure of merchandise exports changed 
substantially between 1965 and 1985. Primary commodities ac- 
counted for 95 percent of Thailand's exports in 1965, and manufac- 
tured exports accounted for only 4 percent. By 1986 manufactured 
products comprised 55 percent of total exports, with textile products 
increasing from less than 1 percent in 1965 to 13 percent by 1986 
(see table 8, Appendix). Other major manufacturing exports in the 
mid-1980s included rubber products, processed foods, integrated 
circuits, metal products, jewelry, footwear, and furniture. Although 
agricultural exports as a percentage of total exports declined dur- 
ing this period, rice and other agricultural exports remained im- 
portant for the Thai economy. By the mid-1980s, rice took the 
highest share of total agricultural exports. Cassava products, maize, 
sugar, rubber, fruit, and marine products were the other main ex- 
ports in this category. 

Between 1965 and 1985, the destinations of merchandise exports 
shifted from 54 percent of 1965 exports destined for develop- 
ing countries to 56 percent of 1985 exports going to industrialized 
countries. This increase in the percentage of exports to industrial- 
ized countries, in combination with the changing structure of 



134 



The Economy 



merchandise exports from predominantly agricultural to manufac- 
tured products, has fueled Thailand's economic growth (see table 9, 
Appendix). Thailand's major industrialized trading partners 
included the EEC, the United States, Japan, and the Netherlands. 
Furthermore, Thailand has developed significant trade relations 
with the newly industrializing countries (NICs) of Singapore, Hong 
Kong, the Republic of Korea (South Korea), and Taiwan. Addi- 
tionally, Thailand has developed trade relations with Malaysia, the 
Philippines, Indonesia, and China (see table 10, Appendix). 

Tariff barriers on imports from the developing countries had 
dropped with the implementation of the Tokyo Round (1973-79) 
of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT — see Glos- 
sary). Rising nontariff barriers, resulting from domestic and in- 
ternational economic conditions in industrial countries, had more 
than offset the tariff reductions. In the United States the propor- 
tion of imports subject to such barriers more than doubled, and 
in the other industrial countries it rose by as much as 40 percent. 
Examples of nontariff barriers were quotas, voluntary exports re- 
straints, the Multifiber Arrangements, sanitation rules, and sub- 
sidies. 

Thai rice exports encountered the stiffest barriers in Japan, where 
the tariff rate was 15 percent and a global quota was in force. In 
the United States, tariff on rice was only 2.6 percent, and no explicit 
nontariff barriers existed except for stringent controls by the United 
States Food and Drug Administration. In the other industrialized 
countries, Thai rice exports faced varying levies. Thai agricultural 
exports to the developing countries met with stiff competition from 
subsidized United States cereal exports. Thailand entered into a 
voluntary export restraint with France for its cassava exports be- 
cause of strong resistance to imports from the French producers 
of cereal-based animal feed. Rubber did not face major barriers 
except for quotas imposed by Japan. Maize exports did relatively 
poorly because of subsidized production and high tariffs in the 
industrialized countries. Sugar exports also faced subsidy problems 
in Western Europe and a 50 percent quota reduction by the United 
States. Despite nontariff barriers, Thai agricultural and manufac- 
tured exports faced less protectionism than the NICs in the early 
1980s. 

Of Thailand's manufactured exports, textiles were most affected 
by barriers because Thailand had to enter into bilateral agreements 
with industrial countries, which were similar to the voluntary export 
restraints under the Multifiber Arrangements. In addition, tariffs 
escalated with the degree of processing. For example, in the United 
States the average tariff for cotton fabrics was 9.6 percent, whereas 



135 



/ 



36 



Phuket, a popular tourist destination in southern Thailand 
Courtesy Thai Airways International 



137 



Thailand: A Country Study 

it was 18 percent for garments. The United States imposed coun- 
tervailing duties on Thai textile exports in protest against Thai 
government subsidies to textile exporters in the form of export pack- 
ing credits, rediscount facilities for industrial bills, electricity dis- 
counts, and tax certificates. 

Tariffs in Thailand before the 1970s were primarily used to gener- 
ate revenues rather than to influence domestic production. The rates 
ranged from 15 to 30 percent, with higher rates applied to finished 
consumer goods imports. In the 1970s, however, tariff rates on 
finished consumer goods imports increased 30 to 50 percent. Ris- 
ing protectionism continued in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with 
high tariff rates and the application of surcharges, quantitative 
restrictions, price controls, and domestic contents requirements (see 
table 11, Appendix). 

External Debt 

The Thai total long-term public and private debt grew from 
US$728 million in 1970 to US$13.3 billion in 1985. The external 
debt was increasing at a faster rate during this period than the grow- 
ing gross national product (GNP — see Glossary). In 1970 the 
external debt was 11.1 percent of GNP, increasing to 36 percent 
of GNP by 1985. The ratio of debt payments or debt service to 
the total export of goods and services, one indicator of Thailand's 
ability to meet debt payments, increased from 14 percent in 1970 
to 25.4 percent in 1985. The growth of external indebtedness aver- 
aged 25.2 percent between 1970 and 1980, compared with an aver- 
age of 21 percent for Southeast and East Asian middle-income 
oil-importer countries. Public debt as a percentage of exports went 
from 47.9 percent to 75.9 percent between 1980 and 1983, but the 
proportion of public borrowing from foreign sources dropped from 
52 percent to 42 percent during the same period. This was indica- 
tive of the growing concern of the public sector with the enlarged 
foreign debt and hence a higher reliance on domestic borrowing, 
which went from 48 percent to 55 percent during the same period. 
In the early 1980s, Thailand was characterized by high competi- 
tion between the government and the private sector for scarce 
domestic savings, which forced private firms to rely more on ex- 
ternal borrowing. 

The composition of Thai indebtedness in terms of interest rates, 
maturity, and currency structure appeared to be better than that 
in most other developing countries. Because of its high credit rat- 
ing, Thailand could borrow at about 8.4 percent in late 1983, com- 
pared with an average rate of 10. 1 percent for other middle-income 
oil-importer countries. It had also the longest loan average matu- 
rity, 17.2 years compared with 12.2 years. 



138 



The Economy 



In terms of currency denomination, the Thai external debt con- 
sisted mostly of two currencies: the United States dollar and the 
Japanese yen, with increasing reliance on the yen because of the 
willingness of Japanese banks to lend at a lower spread than the 
other banks. Thailand was exposed to the risk of yen appreciation 
in the early 1980s because Japan received only 14 percent of Thai 
exports while accounting for 26 percent of imports. Meanwhile, 
the value of the yen had appreciated substantially relative to the 
baht. The baht was pegged to the United States dollar until 1984 
when it had a fixed exchange rate of B23 per US$1. Thereafter, 
the baht was pegged to a basket of currencies and devalued by 14.8 
percent against the dollar. According to some observers, Thailand 
needed to revise its external debt portfolio as well as limit its reli- 
ance on external debt. 

Industry 

The industrial sector in Thailand contributed considerably to 
economic growth during the 1970s and 1980s. As a percentage of 
GDP, industry accounted for an average of 25.7 percent in the 1970s 
and about 29 percent in the mid-1980s. The average annual growth 
rate was 9.3 percent for the 1970s, with a slowdown to 6.7 percent 
in 1985, which was still very respectable by international standards. 
Manufacturing constituted the most important industrial subsec- 
tor, providing an average of 17.9 percent of GDP in the 1970s and 
about 19.8 percent in the mid-1980s. Construction accounted for 
an average of 4.8 percent of GDP during the 1970s and rose to 
5. 1 by the mid-1980s. Mining and quarrying represented an average 
of 1.8 percent of GDP in the 1970s and remained fairly constant. 
The annual growth rate was the highest for the public utilities indus- 
trial subsector in the 1970s and mid-1980s, 13.1 percent and 8.8 
percent, respectively. The annual growth rate for manufacturing 
dropped from an average of 10.1 percent in the 1970s to 7.3 per- 
cent in 1985. A decline in the growth rate of mining and construc- 
tion occurred during the same period. 

Manufacturing 

Manufacturing was the most important industrial subsector in 
Thailand, comprising on average 25 percent of each addition to 
GDP (incremental GDP), or 70 percent of all industrial value added 
during the 1970s and mid-1980s. Manufacturing was character- 
ized by a high reliance on agricultural products, including rubber 
products, textile products, food processing, beverages, and tobacco. 
Thailand's food and agriculture share of manufacturing value added 
was about 36 percent by the mid-1980s, compared with 20 percent 



139 



Thailand: A Country Study 



for South Korea and 22 percent for Malaysia. The next most impor- 
tant area of manufacturing was textiles, clothing, and leather 
products, produced mainly for export, with 23 percent of manufac- 
turing value added. Machinery and transport equipment, which 
consisted mostly of repair and assembly of motor vehicles, accounted 
for 11 percent, and chemicals accounted for 7 percent. The remain- 
ing 23 percent included processed minerals, wood, rubber, car- 
pets, batteries ? rope, gunnysacks, plastic goods, tires, footwear, 
and an expanding domestic small arms production. 

The composition of Thai foreign trade reflected the manufac- 
turing sector of the Thai economy. Exports of processed food, 
leather, wood, rubber, and basic metals represented a considera- 
ble share of manufacturing output. The capital and intermediate 
goods industries were less developed, however, necessitating high 
levels of imports of those products. Exports of manufactured goods 
grew from 5.5 percent of total exports in the 1970s to about 30 
percent by the mid-1980s. Textiles and garments were the most 
important contributors in the 1970s, accounting for almost half of 
the total manufactured exports, but by the mid-1980s they had 
dropped to about 1 3 percent because of rising foreign protectionism 
of textiles. Exports of manufactured goods that grew rapidly dur- 
ing this period were wood products, nonmetallic minerals, elec- 
tronics, electrical machinery, jewelry, and precious stones. 

Employment in the manufacturing subsector accounted for 7.9 
percent of total employment by the mid-1980s and had absorbed 
over 16 percent of labor force growth during the 1970s. Textile, 
apparel, and leather firms had the highest share of manufacturing 
employment, with 25.8 percent in the early 1980s, followed by 
processed food, beverage, and tobacco firms, which accounted for 
19.9 percent. Furniture and other wood products firms accounted 
for 15.8 percent of manufacturing employment; minerals, metals, 
and metal products, 12.6 percent; transportation equipment, 8.5 
percent; and other manufacturing firms accounted for the remaining 
17.4 percent. The growth in manufacturing employment resulted 
both from the absolute growth of the subsector itself and from the 
labor intensiveness of such industries as textiles. Small-scale firms 
with fewer than 10 workers employed 50 percent more workers at 
the beginning of the 1980s than all larger firms. However, both 
groups had the same average annual growth rate of around 10 per- 
cent in the 1970s. 

Manufacturing was heavily concentrated in the Bangkok 
metropolitan area, as indicated by its share of 35.3 percent of total 
manufacturing employment. The next highest area of concentra- 
tion was in the Center. Industries outside Bangkok were based 



140 



The Economy 



primarily on the processing of agricultural products, such as rub- 
ber, sugar, cassava, and rice, or on the repair of agricultural 
implements. Bangkok's role as the manufacturing center resulted 
from its position as the leading port, the largest market, and the 
transportation, communications, and financial center of the country. 

State-owned manufacturing firms produced tobacco, playing 
cards, liquor, marble, jute, sugar, paper, textiles, leather goods, 
glass, batteries, and pharmaceutical products. Each state enterprise 
was required to submit an annual operational and investment 
budget to be approved by its board of directors, its parent minis- 
try, the Bureau of the Budget, and the National Economic and 
Social Development Board under the Office of the Prime Minister. 
Each firm had on its board of directors between nine and eleven 
members, all of whom were appointed by the parent ministry. The 
board was responsible for setting prices with the approval of the 
parent ministry. State enterprises were more unionized and more 
powerful than private firms and often had salaries 50 percent higher 
than those in the civil service and in some private firms. They also 
offered higher fringe benefits, bonuses, and overtime pay. Plan- 
ning for privatization of some unprofitable state-owned manufac- 
turing firms was under way in the mid-1980s, but the government 
faced labor opposition and other difficulties in selling these firms. 

Foreign enterprises accounted for about 30 percent of capital 
investment in the form of joint ventures with some twenty foreign 
countries. Japan provided more than one-third of total foreign 
investment, the United States more than one-seventh, and Taiwan 
less than one-eighth. The general attitude of the people toward for- 
eign firms was favorable until the early 1970s. At that time, world 
commodities prices collapsed, causing hardship in the country. This 
collapse was popularly perceived as resulting from foreign involve- 
ment in the economy. Students and liberal elements demanded that 
contracts with foreign enterprises be reexamined and renegotiated. 
To placate these groups, the government revoked the extensive off- 
shore concession of the foreign-owned Thailand Exploration and 
Mining Company (TEMCO). 

In the late 1980s, Thailand was considering large-scale indus- 
trial development plans, such as the Eastern Seaboard Develop- 
ment Program, which included deep-sea port facilities, a natural 
gas-based petrochemical complex, a soda ash project, a fertilizer 
plant, and an integrated steel complex. The petrochemical indus- 
tries complex was to be developed southeast of Bangkok and was 
to include a plant to process ethane and propane into ethylene and 
propylene. It was to be a public and private joint-venture project 
costing an estimated US$600 million. 



141 



Thailand: A Country Study 

The site of the Eastern Seaboard Development Program was to 
be a major center for industrial development that would extend 
from east of Bangkok toward the Cambodian border. The site was 
chosen because of its proximity to Bangkok, access to raw materi- 
als and labor supplies from the Northeast, availability of an exist- 
ing deep-sea port on the Gulf of Thailand, and excellent road and 
communications infrastructure. One objective of the program was 
to decentralize economic activities away from Bangkok. The other 
goals were the development of a wide range of industries, includ- 
ing agro-industries, around Si Racha-Laem Chabang and the de- 
velopment of tourism in and around Pattaya, a popular beach resort 
area. The total capital requirement for the project was estimated 
at US$4.5 billion: about 66 percent for heavy industrial develop- 
ment; about 20 percent for infrastructure; 7 percent for housing, 
industrial estates, and urban services; and the remainder for light 
industries. 

Industrial Policy 

The Thai industrial sector was under the supervision of seven 
governmental agencies. The Ministry of Finance administered taxes 
and duties and provided tax refunds on exports. It was involved 
in large-scale industrial projects in the role of deciding on govern- 
ment equity participation, arranging public foreign borrowing to 
support the project, and extending protection through tariffs. The 
Board of Investment provided investment incentives, and the Minis- 
try of Commerce controlled prices and international trade. The 
Ministry of Industry issued factory licenses, drew up industrial regu- 
lations, and enforced zoning laws. It also provided technical as- 
sistance, management training, and financing for small- and 
medium- sized enterprises. The Industrial Finance Corporation of 
Thailand lent long-term funds to medium- and large-scale firms 
from credit given by the government. The Bank of Thailand provid- 
ed foreign exchange and rediscount facilities to selected industries 
and exporters at concessionary terms. Finally, the National Eco- 
nomic and Social Development Board established policy guidelines 
and targets for the industrial sector. In 1982 the Industrial 
Restructuring Committee was created to coordinate the various 
agencies and to formulate detailed policy proposals in line with eco- 
nomic development plans. 

Import tariffs were the most important protective measure used 
for the industrial sector. In the 1960s, the nominal tariff rates were 
low, ranging from 25 to 30 percent. In the 1970s, the rate went 
up to a range of 30 to 55 percent for consumer goods. By the end 
of 1978, nine import categories had tariff rates above 90 percent, 



142 



Technician at the natural gas-fueled 
Ban Pakong power- generating station southeast of Bangkok 

Courtesy World Bank 

including alcoholic beverages, shoes, perfume, cosmetics, and auto- 
mobiles. In the early 1980s, the government attempted a more uni- 
form tariff structure and lower protectionism in conformity with 
the Fifth Economic Development Plan. The adjustments included 
a reduction in tariffs to 60 percent on 270 categories of imported 
commodities; a change in tariffs to 30 percent for 1,970 items; and 
an increase in rate to 5 percent for those nonessential items that 
had been exempted. Goods considered essential, such as milk for 
infants or fibers used in textiles, remained exempted. 

Other protective measures included price controls, which were 
quite pervasive in the 1970s but were relaxed at the beginning of 
the 1980s, except on petroleum products, white sugar, and sweet- 
ened condensed milk. Quantitative restrictions on imports were 
increased in the early 1980s to cover forty-six products. Regula- 
tions requiring a certain percentage of domestic content in manufac- 
tured imports included 30 to 40 percent for commercial vehicles, 
45 percent for automobiles, and 70 percent for motorcycles. 

In order to encourage investment, the Board of Investment 
provided incentives, such as guarantees against nationalization and 
price controls, tax exemptions of up to 8 years, and tariff surcharges 
of up to 50 percent to protect against competing imports. The basic 



143 



Thailand: A Country Study 



objectives of the board were to promote labor-intensive industries, 
exports, and regional decentralization of industry. 

Agriculture 

Much of the impressive economic growth recorded by Thailand 
in the 1970s and the early 1980s was owed to the steady expansion 
of the agricultural sector. This sector provided adequate food for 
the rapidly growing population and produced substantial surpluses 
of some commodities for export. 

The Thai farmer's ability to adapt to changing market condi- 
tions contributed to the country's agricultural success, but even 
more important was the availability of large areas of virgin land 
for cultivation. Between 1950 and 1980, agricultural holdings nearly 
doubled to an estimated 22 million hectares, of which about three- 
quarters were farmed annually, and much of the rapidly growing 
population was absorbed in the expansion. By the early 1980s, 
however, most of the arable land had been occupied, except in the 
South, and continued growth of the agricultural sector became 
increasingly dependent on the acceptance of new technologies and 
the adoption of more intensive cultivation. Observers feared that 
without these changes growing domestic demand — both from 
increasing population and from rising expectations — would seri- 
ously affect the nation's balance of payments position through the 
reduction of exportable surpluses of vital major foreign exchange 
earners, such as rice and sugar. 

Agriculture — crops, livestock, forestry, and fisheries — employed 
about three-quarters of the labor force, and it was estimated that 
some four-fifths of the total population was dependent on the sec- 
tor for its livelihood. During the mid-1980s, agriculture accounted 
for an average of about 25 percent of GDP, and agricultural com- 
modities accounted annually for over 60 percent of the value of 
all exports. 

The type of agriculture engaged in — whether cash crop, subsis- 
tence, or a combination thereof — varied from region to region and 
within regions. In the central plain, there were farmers whose sole 
activity was the raising of such cash crops as maize, sugarcane, 
vegetables, and fruit. In the rice bowl region of the central plain, 
farmers grew rice for sale as a main crop. Elsewhere, rice was raised 
basically for subsistence purposes, but many farmers also cultivated 
secondary crops for the market. In areas without developed access 
roads and services, such as parts of the upper Northeast, partici- 
pation in the market economy was limited. Farmers in these areas 
practiced subsistence cultivation, selling only an occasional sur- 
plus locally. 



144 



Farmers in Chiang Mai Province, northern Thailand 

Courtesy World Bank 



Agriculture was dominated by smallholders, most of whom had 
either outright title to the land or effective possession of it; tenancy 
was significant only in parts of the central plain. In the early 1980s, 
the average holding for the whole country was about 5.6 hectares, 
but considerable size differences existed within different regions 
and locales that related in part to terrain, soils, rainfall, and other 
natural factors. In the North, where nearly a quarter of the nation's 
more than 4.5 million agricultural households were located (1983 
estimate), over half the land is mountainous. In the upper part of 
the region, which is characterized by narrow valleys, average hold- 
ings were only about 2.2 hectares. In the parts of this upper area 
that had controlled irrigation, the typical farm only had slightly 
more than one hectare. A farm on nonirrigated land consisted of 
about two hectares, part of which was rain-fed paddy and part 
upland. The lower part of the region had areas similar to those 
in the central plain. Farms were considerably larger, the typical 
one having close to five hectares. Both paddy and upland crops 
were grown, and maize had become an important secondary cash 
crop for many farmers (see table 12, Appendix). 

In the Northeast, the generally infertile soil required larger hold- 
ings to meet subsistence needs. Over half the farms had between 
2.4 and 7.2 hectares, and the typical farm had an area of about 
4 hectares. In the early 1980s, about 40 percent of the country's 



145 



Thailand: A Country Study 

agricultural households lived in this region. Holdings in the Center, 
which contained about 20 percent of the nation's agricultural house- 
holds, varied considerably. Near Bangkok small farms producing 
market vegetables might have little more than half a hectare, 
whereas commercial rice farms outside the city averaged over ten 
hectares. The typical commercial rice holding on the central plain, 
however, averaged somewhat over three hectares, and all avail- 
able land was under cultivation. In the upland to the east of the 
plain, where maize was grown commercially, the typical farm size 
was close to 6.5 hectares. Cassava was also grown in this area on 
somewhat smaller farms, typically of about five hectares. West of 
the plain, the uplands were devoted in part to sugarcane grown 
on holdings usually of about three hectares. In the South, the rugged 
terrain made about two-fifths of the region unsuitable for agricul- 
ture. The climate, however, favored the cultivation of rubber trees, 
and the majority of farms grew rubber as a cash crop along with 
subsistence rice. A typical household had about three hectares: 1.5 
hectares of rubber trees, small areas of coconut or fruit trees, and 
the rest planted in rice. In the three southernmost provinces hold- 
ings were smaller, averaging about two hectares. 

Land Use and Soils 

Roughly two-fifths of Thailand is covered by mountains and hills, 
the steepness of which generally precludes cultivation. Neverthe- 
less, perhaps as much as a tenth of this area might also be con- 
verted to agricultural purposes once detailed information was 
obtained through surveys. Estimates in the 1970s of overall land- 
use suitability classified roughly 58 percent of mountainous and 
hilly regions as cultivable (compared with 24 percent 2 decades 
earlier), of which about 19 percent was usable for paddy, 28 per- 
cent for upland crops, and 11 percent for both paddy and upland 
agriculture. Actual holdings of agricultural land — not all of which 
was under cultivation at any one time — were estimated in the 
mid-1970s to occupy about 43 percent of the total land area. 

Soils throughout most of the country are of low fertility, largely 
as a result of leaching by heavy rainfall. Differences between the 
various soil types are the result of differences in parent rock material, 
variations in the amount of rainfall, length of wet and dry seasons, 
type of vegetable cover, and other natural factors. In general, stony 
and shallow soils characterize the hill and mountain terrain of the 
North. 

Large portions of this mountainous area were traditionally used 
by hill peoples for shifting cultivation (see Glossary). The Lua (also 
called Lawa) and Karen cultivated for short periods, then permitted 



146 



The Economy 



the land to lie fallow for long periods, which allowed forest regrowth 
and restoration of soil fertility (see The Non-Tai Minorities, ch. 2). 
As a result of population pressures, however, other groups some- 
times failed to follow this practice. The principle crop of many hill 
peoples was upland rice; maize was an important secondary crop. 
The Hmong, Lisu, and certain other hill peoples cultivated the 
opium poppy as a cash crop, but this activity had important 
implications for internal stability as well as major international 
repercussions (see Criminal Activity and the Narcotics Trade, 
ch. 5). Thai authorities, with substantial international assistance, 
increased efforts in the 1980s to redirect these people to other cash 
crops, including tobacco and coffee. 

Many inhabitants of the lowlands in the North also practiced 
shifting cultivation in hill areas lying not far above the valleys. The 
valleys usually had better soils, some of fairly high or moderate 
fertility, which were used mainly to grow irrigated rice. In places 
where population pressures had developed, the higher areas were 
often turned to shifting cultivation to supplement lowland produc- 
tion. The principal crop was usually upland rice, although other 
crops were also grown. 

Shallow sandy loams cover a large part of the Khorat Plateau. 
Their generally low fertility partly explains the lower economic level 
of the region. Soils along the main rivers are more fertile, and 
alluvial loams of high fertility are found along the Mekong River. 
Lowland soils covering about a fifth of the Northeast (some 3.5 
million hectares) had been converted to rice paddy. 

The central plain rice-growing area and the delta of the Mae 
Nam (river) Chao Phraya has clayey soils of high to moderate fer- 
tility. Low-lying and flat, much of the area is flooded during the 
rainy season. Higher areas on the edges of the plain are generally 
well-drained soils of high to moderate fertility that are suitable for 
intensive cultivation. These lands are used extensively for maize 
and sugarcane. Among other highly useful soils are the well-drained 
clayey and loamy soils in parts of the peninsula where rubber is 
grown . 

Land Tenure 

Traditionally, the king owned all the land, from which he made 
grants to nobles, officials, and other free subjects. If left unculti- 
vated for three years, the land could be taken back by the crown, 
but otherwise it could be passed on to heirs or mortgaged or sold. 
At the same time, there was abundant unoccupied cultivable land 
that by tradition and custom could be cleared and used by a farmer, 
who after three years of continuous cultivation established informal 



147 



Thailand: A Country Study 

rights. The concept of individual ownership of the land was intro- 
duced during the reign of King Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 
1868-1910), and beginning in 1901 formal title could be acquired. 

The titling of land in the mid-1980s was based on a land code 
promulgated in 1954. The 1954 code established eight hectares as 
the maximum permissible holding except where the owner could 
manage a larger holding by himself. This limitation was generally 
ignored, however, and was rescinded four years later. A title deed 
(chanod tidin) giving unrestricted ownership rights ordinarily was 
issued only after a cadastral survey. At least two prior steps were 
required before the prospective landholder could obtain a full title 
deed. Application was first made to occupy and cultivate a piece 
of unused land, and a temporary occupancy permit (bai chong — 
reserve license) that carried no title rights was received. After 75 
percent of the land had been cultivated, the landholder could secure 
an exploitation testimonial {nor sor). This gave him the right to 
occupy the land permanently and to pass the property on to heirs; 
in effect it was an assurance that a title deed eventually would be 
forthcoming. Transferring the land through sale, however, was 
extremely difficult, and the exploitation testimonial was not usually 
accepted by banks as collateral. In the case of squatters, a special 
occupancy permit (sor kor) could also be obtained, unless the land 
was in a permanent reserved forest or was intended for public use. 
Satisfactory development could then lead to the issuance of an 
exploitation testimonial and ultimately a full title deed. 

The issuance of title deeds, which proceeded at a relatively slow 
pace in the early 1950s, quickened somewhat during the remainder 
of the decade. By 1960 the total number of title deeds for agricul- 
tural land had reached 1 million, although there were 3.4 million 
agricultural households (this total included an unknown number 
of tenants' households). The pressure for titles of various kinds 
increased during the 1960s and 1970s as the number of farm hold- 
ings expanded rapidly. In an effort to expedite the processing of 
title deeds, the Department of Land of the Ministry of Interior 
resorted in the 1970s to the use of aerial photography in lieu of 
land surveys. 

In the 1980s, a substantial component of the nation's dominant 
smallholder group nevertheless lacked full tide to the land it worked. 
By 1982 the total number of title deeds was 3.9 million. A 1976 
estimate placed the proportion of farm holdings having formal title 
at about 60 percent. The lack of full title by the remaining 40 per- 
cent created not only a sense of insecurity for the landholder but 
also presented a barrier to securing needed credit. 



148 



The Economy 



A major question in the mid-1980s concerned the legalization 
of farm holdings outside recognized areas for land acquisition. An 
unknown but substantial number of holdings had been established 
by squatters — many of them hill people — in the reserve forests, 
which, according to the central government, were not eligible for 
tiding, although the de facto possession of such holdings was recog- 
nized by local authorities. Observers pointed out that in many cases 
of forest encroachment the occupied land was incorrectly classi- 
fied and in fact was suitable for cultivation (some reclassification 
was reported in the late 1970s). It also appeared that in the draft- 
ing of the country's land laws there was an underlying assump- 
tion that agricultural land meant the lowlands; in other words, the 
land in mountainous and hill areas was considered nonagricultural. 
Thus, a large part of the North was not even included in the land 
registration system, and the hill peoples of the region were there- 
fore unable to acquire legal title to the land they used. 

Tenancy and Land Reform 

Historically, agricultural tenancy nationwide appeared to have 
been low except in the commercial rice-growing areas of the cen- 
tral plain and in the North. This situation was the result of land 
reforms instituted by King Chulalongkorn beginning in 1874, the 
great availability of free land, the absence of population pressures, 
and the relatively small amount of funds required by the individual 
farmer to start cultivating rice. Together with customary practices 
that tended to limit the amount of cultivable land that could be 
claimed, these factors resulted in a national pattern of small inde- 
pendent farms. Of great significance to this development was the 
law that the farmer had to cultivate his own land; if it was more 
than he or his family could handle, the farmer had to supervise 
cultivation of the excess. Four hectares were considered the maxi- 
mum tillable by one family, although with hired help up to about 
eight hectares could be managed, the amount varying with soil 
differences and climatic conditions. 

Nineteenth-century legislation set a four-hectare limit on freely 
acquirable agricultural land and acted as a major deterrent to the 
accumulation of land into large estates. Nevertheless, large hold- 
ings did exist as grants to nobles and officials under the sakdi na 
(see Glossary) system (see Social and Political Development, ch. 1). 
Chulalongkorn' s reforms played an important part in the breakup 
of at least some large estates. In such cases the law provided that 
the uncultivated land would revert to the state after a period of 
three years. In the area around the capital, however, where many 



149 



Thailand: A Country Study 

larger holdings were located, land could be rented out, and the 
landholdings therefore remained intact. 

Statistical data on tenancy in the mid-twentieth century varied 
considerably. A problem of classification concerning whether the 
fairly numerous part owner-part tenant arrangements should be 
included with owners or tenants also led to different conclusions. 
The part owner-part tenant group consisted largely of farmers who 
owned small plots but also worked as tenants on other larger farms. 

In some areas, 95 percent of the farmers were reported to be 
deeply in debt. According to the government censuses of agricul- 
ture in 1950 and 1963, the rates of full tenancy for the country 
as a whole were 6.6 percent and 4.1 percent, respectively. Rates 
varied significantly by region. In 1963 the rate in the Center, the 
chief agricultural area containing the rice- growing central plain, 
was 10.7 percent as compared with 1.1 percent in the North. A 
special 1967-68 survey of the Center determined the full tenancy 
rate to be 22.5 percent (part owners-part tenants constituted an 
additional 15.8 percent). A 1973-74 survey of the Center, as well 
as other regions, showed the full-tenancy rate in the Center to be 
12 percent (part owners-part tenants constituted another 28 per- 
cent). The remainder were full owners. Tenancy in the Center in 
areas devoted completely to commercialized agriculture was very 
high, however, especially in some districts near Bangkok where 
as many as 75 to 85 percent of the farmers were reported in the 
mid-1970s to be full tenants. Lower, but still comparatively high, 
rates of tenancy were also found in certain other districts of the plain. 

The unusually high tenancy rates were attributed to several fac- 
tors, including the proximity to Bangkok of estates that were granted 
to the ancestors of present-day holders under the sakdi na system; 
large holdings received as remuneration for the digging of canals; 
and, since the 1950s, acquisition of land as investment by indi- 
viduals residing mostly in Bangkok. Figures published in 1975 
covering 4 provinces in the Bangkok area cited 119 estates rang- 
ing in size from 160 hectares to 1,600 hectares and comprising a 
total of more than 60,000 hectares. Another factor contributing 
to tenancy in the central plain was the loss of holdings to creditors 
by farmers unable to repay loans. A large proportion of the small 
leaseholds was reported to be owned by storekeepers, local crafts- 
men, and other farmers. 

The 1973-74 agricultural survey also provided data on tenancy 
in other regions. In the North, the survey found that 4 percent 
of the farmer operators were full tenants, 25 percent were part 
owners-part tenants, and 69 percent were full owners. The 
southeastern provinces of the North, where conditions resemble 



150 



Rice harvesting 
in northern Thailand 
Courtesy World Bank 



Coffee cultivation 
in northern Thailand 
Courtesy World Bank 



those of the central plain, reportedly had a higher percentage of 
farmers renting some or all of their land. In the Northeast, full 
tenants constituted only a negligible proportion; 89 percent of farm 
operators were full owners, and 8 percent were part owners-part 
tenants. 

In the South, full tenants likewise were only a very small minor- 
ity; 83 percent were full owners, and 16 percent were part owners- 
part tenants. One reason given for the development of the part 
owner-part tenant situation was the effect of Islamic inheritance 
laws, which in theory divide the land equally among the children. 
In such cases, the inherited holding might be inadequate to meet 
family needs, and supplementary land would be rented. The part 
owned-part rented condition was not in itself detrimental. There 
appeared to be many cases in which additional land was rented 
solely because the farmer family believed it would benefit finan- 
cially by cultivating it. 

Unrest among tenants, who constituted a substantial portion of 
the nation's poorer farmers, began to manifest itself in the early 
1970s. Tenant discontent centered chiefly on the amount of rent, 



151 



Thailand: A Country Study 

but also of great concern was the fact that use of the land was often 
based on a verbal agreement that rarely exceeded one year and 
carried no guarantees of renewal. In 1950 a land rent-control act 
covering part of the central plain was passed but proved generally 
ineffective. The civilian cabinet that succeeded to power in October 
1973 promised rent and land reform. Implementing action was not 
immediately forthcoming, however, and farmer dissatisfaction 
mounted, finally erupting in demonstrations in May and June 1974. 
In December of that year, the government passed a rent reform 
law known as the Agricultural Land Rent Control Act of 1974, 
providing for six-year, indefinitely renewable rental contracts. Rents 
were to be payable once a year only, and procedures for determining 
the amount were specified. Moreover, if a poor harvest occurred, 
the rent was to be reduced, and none would be paid if the harvest 
were less than one-third normal. 

Associated with tenancy was the equally serious problem of land- 
less farmers, who by the early 1980s numbered an estimated 500,000 
to 700,000. In January 1975, the civilian government, over strong 
opposition, managed to get through the National Assembly a sec- 
ond reform measure of potentially far-reaching effect. This was the 
Agricultural Land Reform Act of 1975. The legislation called for 
the establishment of the Agricultural Land Reform Office in the 
Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives to serve as the implement- 
ing agency. Under the act, landless and tenant farmers could be 
allocated up to eight hectares of land that would be paid for on 
a long-term installment basis. The land to be allocated was to come 
from purchases from private holders and from forest and crown 
lands. Individual landowners were required to make available to 
the program all but eight hectares of their holding. Under certain 
circumstances, larger holdings could be retained, but such hold- 
ings could be expropriated later if the provisions of the exception 
were not met. Payment for the private land taken was to be 25 
percent in cash and the remainder in government bonds. 

Implementation of land reform slowed after the coup of October 
1976, which ousted the civilian government, and the act's goals 
were subsequently shifted. The government of Prime Minister 
Thanin Kraivichien, installed as head of a military regime in Octo- 
ber 1976, announced that a land reform program covering 1 .6 mil- 
lion hectares and taking place over a period of four years would 
be carried out. Prime Minister Kriangsak Chomanand, who suc- 
ceeded to office in November 1977 after still another military coup, 
modified this goal to a more realistic one of 1.3 million hectares 
over five years. By early 1979, almost eighty areas throughout the 
country had been designated Land Reform Areas under the 



152 



The Economy 



program. At the same time, although tenancy remained a major 
issue, a somewhat different concept of reform seemed to have 
emerged, based on the belief that the most pressing problem was 
to improve the situation of the large numbers of illegal squatters 
in the forests. The Land Reform Areas included some areas of high 
tenancy, but the new goal of helping forest squatters appeared easier 
to promote than land acquisition by the Agricultural Land Reform 
Office in the high-tenancy areas of the central plain. There it was 
strongly opposed by large landowners, including wealthy aristocrats, 
businessmen, and senior military officers. 

The program as projected included furnishing legal titles to squat- 
ters and providing them with needed infrastructure and credit. The 
areas brought under the program were to be organized into self- 
sufficient cooperatives. Implementation of a given project was 
expected to take about two years, including about a year and a 
half to get the basic infrastructure well under way and to provide 
titles. The latter would permit the landholder to pass on the land 
to heirs but would not confer the right to sell it to private parties. 
The title, however, could be used as collateral for credit. Accord- 
ing to government sources, by 1978 some 320,000 hectares con- 
sisting mainly of public land had been distributed, and another 
160,000 hectares were ready to be apportioned. 

Irrigation 

Thai farmers traditionally relied on rain and flood water for crops, 
but the amount needed for rice cultivation was not always received. 
By the mid- 1800s, a number of canals had been constructed in the 
central plain to carry floodwaters from the Chao Phraya, and in 
the latter half of the century other canals were dug. The canals 
did not form a controlled irrigation system, however, but simply 
a distribution net, and whether additional water could be made 
available depended on the level of the rivers. Records covering 
almost a hundred years to 1930 showed that in about one-third 
of the years water from the rivers was insufficient, resulting in con- 
siderable crop losses. In 1902 the government contracted with a 
Dutch expert to develop a controlled irrigation plan for the entire 
country but failed to take further action. Droughts in 1910 and 
1911 led to renewed interest and the hiring of a British irrigation 
specialist. Nevertheless, the first irrigation project was not com- 
pleted until 1922. 

By 1938 about 440,000 hectares had been irrigated. Supply 
problems held up projects during World War II, but work resumed 
with renewed vigor in the late 1940s. By 1950 the irrigated area 
totaled nearly 650,000 hectares. In 1950 Thailand secured the first 



153 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of a series of loans from the World Bank (see Glossary) for the con- 
struction of the vital Chainant Diversion Dam on the Chao Phraya 
and a number of major canals. By 1960 over 1.5 million hectares 
had been irrigated, almost entirely in the Center and in the North. 

Systematic development of the irrigation system began with the 
First Economic Development Plan (1961-66) and was continued 
in later plans. New assistance from the World Bank included financ- 
ing of the important multipurpose Phumiphon (Bhumibol) Dam 
(completed in 1964) on the Mae Nam Ping and the Sirikit Dam 
(completed in 1973) on the Mae Nam Nan. These dams, both of 
which have associated hydroelectric power- generating facilities, 
impound water at two large reservoir locations in the Chao Phraya 
Basin. Other World Bank-financed projects were also carried out 
in this basin during the 1970s, and by the end of the decade nearly 
1.3 million hectares had controlled water flow in the rainy season, 
and about 450,000 hectares had it in the dry season. 

The Chao Phraya Basin's natural features, as well as its size, 
made it the most important area for irrigation development. The 
topography and water systems of the Northeast, by contrast, were 
not well suited to large-scale irrigation projects (except on the 
Mekong River, which would involve major resettlement problems). 
Controlled irrigation potentially could encompass about 10 per- 
cent of the Northeast's 3.5 million hectares of paddy. Beginning 
in the 1960s, the Royal Irrigation Department, founded in 1904 
and largely responsible for development and maintenance of the 
country's main irrigation systems, constructed 6 large and about 
200 small dams in the region. The associated irrigation system con- 
tained design defects, and in the mid-1970s improvement was 
undertaken with World Bank assistance. Part of the irrigable area 
was receiving water in the early 1980s, but completion of neces- 
sary additional work was not anticipated before the late 1980s, at 
which time about 160,000 hectares would have irrigation throughout 
the year. 

Irrigation work also began in the 1960s in the Mae Nam Mae 
Klong Basin, which contained nearly 400,000 irrigable hectares 
of paddy. Regulated wet-season irrigation was furnished during 
the 1970s for roughly 175,000 hectares. A multiple dam completed 
in the late 1970s and a distribution system under way in the 1980s 
was expected to provide adequate water for double cropping on 
over 250,000 hectares. Small irrigation projects also were started 
in the 1960s in the South, on the east coast where more than 500,000 
of the region's 600,000 hectares of paddy were located. About 
75,000 hectares had supplementary wet-season water, and work 



154 



The Economy 



under way in the 1980s in the Mae Nam Pattani Basin was expected 
eventually to serve about 52,000 hectares. 

Crops 

Climatic and soil conditions permit the cultivation of a wide range 
of crops, not only tropical varieties but also many originating in 
semitropical and temperate zones. Until the late 1950s, however, 
the major emphasis in agriculture was on rice and, secondarily, 
on rubber, which together accounted for over half the value of all 
commodity exports. Other crops regularly grown included maize, 
cassava, potatoes, yams, beans, sugarcane, fruit, cotton, and var- 
ious oilseeds, but all were supplementary and intended basically 
for domestic use. Historically, Thailand's independent status had 
kept it from being saddled with a colonial plantation economy, in 
which two or three principal crops were produced for world mar- 
kets or for the imperial power. Agricultural production, however, 
had been strongly influenced by the West after the Bowring Treaty 
of 1855 with Britain, which resulted in crop diversification (see The 
Bangkok Period, 1767-1932, ch. 1). Accordingly, when new mar- 
ket conditions — increased world demand, higher prices, and de- 
veloping domestic industry — arose during the 1960s and 1970s, 
Thailand's independent small farmers responded by expanding sub- 
stantially the output of many secondary crops. The flexibility of 
the Thai farmer was evidenced by an unprecedented shift from rice 
production to other crops by a considerable number of households. 
In other cases, many farmers continued to produce rice for subsis- 
tence purposes while expanding their activities to grow market- 
oriented upland crops. In the mid-1980s, major export crops 
included not only rice and rubber but also maize, cassava, sugar- 
cane, mung beans, tobacco, and sorghum. Other important crops 
in which major production increases also had been made were 
pineapples, peanuts, cashew nuts, soybeans, bananas, sesame, coco- 
nuts, cotton, kapok, and castor beans. 

Rice 

Rice, the nation's major crop, was grown by about three-quarters 
of all farm households in the early 1980s. Two main types were 
cultivated: dry, or upland, rice, grown predominantly in the North 
and Northeast; and wet rice, grown in irrigated fields throughout 
the central plain and in the South. About half the 1986 production 
of 19 million tons was grown in the central plain and major valleys 
in the North; another two-fifths was produced in the Northeast; 
and about 6 percent came from the South, which was a rice defi- 
cient area. Roughly 8.5 million hectares were devoted to rice 



155 



Thailand: A Country Study 

production in the early 1980s, about 40 percent more than in the 
early 1960s. The rice yield was highest in the Center, averaging 
about 1.9 tons per hectare, which was about a third of the yield 
per hectare in Taiwan and South Korea. 

Low productivity was attributed in part to longstanding govern- 
ment policies aimed at keeping consumer rice prices low. The so- 
called rice premium (in fact an export tax) and occasional quan- 
titative export controls were claimed by opponents to have dis- 
couraged production expansion by reducing profitability. Although 
perhaps a valid argument for commercial rice farming, the poli- 
cies probably had a minimal effect on the large number of subsis- 
tence farmers in the Northeast and North, who produced small, 
if any, surpluses and whose dry rice was not usually exported. 
Perhaps more significant was the apparent loss of paddy fertility 
in the North and Northeast because of poor soil management and 
the extension in those regions of the growth of lower yield upland 
rice. 

Rubber 

In 1901 British planters introduced rubber trees into the Malay 
Peninsula, where the soils and climatic conditions were highly suited 
to rubber cultivation. In Thailand early government restrictions 
on foreign investment led to development of the industry by local 
smallholders, usually subsistence rice farmers who were able to start 
rubber tree stands on the relatively abundant free land in the area. 
Land under rubber cultivation expanded rapidly in the 1930s, con- 
sisting mainly of smallholdings controlled by Chinese, Thai, and 
Thai Malays rather than large, European-owned plantations, as 
in other Asian countries. Thailand had about 1.6 million hectares 
in rubber in the mid-1970s, of which about 10 percent were located 
in an area along the Gulf of Thailand southeast of Bangkok. Of 
the 500,000 holdings in the early 1980s, about 150,000 were under 
2.5 hectares in size, and another 300,000 were under 10 hectares. 
The remaining larger holdings were operated more as expanded 
smallholdings than as plantations. Production was increasing in 
the early 1980s and had reached about 830,000 tons in 1987. An 
extensive replanting program, in which old tree stock was replaced 
with new high-yield varieties, had reportedly been carried out in 
about half the planted area by the mid-1980s, significantly increas- 
ing the potential for expanded production. 

Maize 

Maize was believed to have been introduced by Spanish or 
Portuguese traders in the sixteenth century. Export interest and 



156 



Smallholder farmer 
taps rubber tree 
for latex 
Courtesy World Bank 



Rubber being 
processed 
for transport 
Courtesy World Bank 




157 



Thailand: A Country Study 

profitability led to increased maize cultivation after World War 
II and the introduction of the so-called Guatemala strain in 1951. 
Output rose rapidly thereafter to almost 600,000 tons in 1961, over 
1 million tons in 1965, and 2.3 million tons in 1971. A record 5 
million tons were produced in 1985. Fertilizer use was limited, 
however, and there was concern that yields would gradually decline. 
The grain was grown throughout Thailand, but the uplands around 
the central plain were especially suitable. Weather conditions usually 
permitted commercial growers to produce two crops a year. 

Cassava 

Cassava, a root crop from which tapioca is made, was introduced 
in about 1935. The tubers may also be boiled and eaten as a vegeta- 
ble or ground into flour. An important food in many tropical sub- 
sistence economies, cassava had never been significant in Thailand 
in the past because of the abundance of rice. Cassava developed 
into an important export item in the 1950s, and production con- 
tinued through the 1970s and 1980s as external demand increased. 
Thai output of cassava root in 1984 was more than 19 million tons, 
second only to Brazil in world production. The main growing areas 
were Chon Buri and Rayong provinces, southeast of Bangkok, but 
substantial quantities were also grown in parts of the Northeast. 
In 1986 Thailand signed a 4-year tapioca trade agreement with 
the EEC calling for export of 2 1 million tons of tapioca during the 
1987-91 period. 

Other Crops 

Sugarcane has long been widely grown. Some commercializa- 
tion was reported by the mid-nineteenth century, but the crop be- 
came of major importance only after World War II. In the early 
1950s, production averaged 1.6 million tons annually, and in the 
late 1950s self-sufficiency in sugar was attained. In 1960 Thailand 
became a net exporter of sugar. Rising world prices led Thailand's 
market-responsive farmers to expand cropped areas in the 1970s. 
In 1976 sugarcane production reached a record 26.1 million tons, 
and sugar output totaled 2.2 million tons, the latter amount being 
considerably in excess of international and domestic demands. 
Drought in 1977 greatly reduced output and seriously affected many 
small growers. Declining world prices after 1975, drought, and 
lower producer prices in 1978 led many farmers to shift to alter- 
nate crops. In 1986 about 24 million tons of sugarcane were 
produced. 

Productivity was low compared with other major sugarcane- 
growing countries (about fifty-three tons of sugarcane per hectare 



158 



The Economy 



against Taiwan's seventy tons and Indonesia's eighty tons in the 
mid-1970s). Introduction of new varieties and improved cultiva- 
tion and cropping practices were needed to raise output levels. The 
principal sugarcane-growing areas were in and around Kan- 
chanaburi Province and in Chon Buri Province in the Center. 
Sugarcane was also grown in the Northeast and in the North around 
Chiang Mai, Lampang, and Uttaradit. 

Kenaf, a coarse fiber similar to jute but of somewhat lesser qual- 
ity, is native to the country and has long been grown for local use 
in making sacks, cord, and twine. Commercial cultivation began 
in the Northeast in the 1950s, and production was largely concen- 
trated in the central and eastern parts of the region in 1980. World 
shortages created by the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 temporarily 
stimulated Thai production of jute, as did shortages resulting from 
the 1971 civil war in Pakistan. The recovery of jute cultivation in 
Bangladesh (formerly East Pakistan) and broad swings in producer 
prices led many Thai farmers in the late 1970s to replace kenaf 
with cassava, which commanded a higher return. The 1984 kenaf 
crop was estimated at about 200,000 tons, compared with an aver- 
age annual output of over 400,000 tons in the previous decade. 
Increased world demand, however, was expected to encourage a 
revival in planting. 

Tobacco, an important foreign exchange earner, had long been 
grown by farmers for personal and local use. Virginia flue-cured 
tobacco had been produced commercially since the 1930s, but export 
began only in 1956. Some burley and oriental (Turkish) tobacco 
was also grown. United Nations sanctions against Rhodesia be- 
ginning in the mid-1960s opened new markets, and production of 
Virginia tobacco rose from 13,700 tons in 1967 to more than 50,000 
tons in 1981. About half of the commercial tobacco was grown in 
the North and another quarter in the Northeast. Tobacco growers 
were licensed, and a large number operated under the aegis of the 
state-owned Thai Tobacco Monopoly. 

Pineapples, exported chiefly as canned fruit and juice in the early 
1980s, were grown solely as a supplementary crop for local use until 
the first pineapple cannery was opened in 1967. A shortage of fruit 
led several canneries to establish large pineapple plantations (rang- 
ing up to more than 3,000 hectares — in sharp contrast to the small- 
holding character of most Thai agriculture), which supplied about 
40 percent of cannery needs in the late 1970s. The industry grew 
dramatically, and by the early 1980s Thailand was one of the world's 
largest exporters of pineapples, producing about 1.6 million tons 
in 1984. 



159 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Production and export of coffee expanded rapidly after Thailand 
became a member of the International Coffee Organization in 1981 . 
Exports of coffee beans, most of which were grown in the South, 
reached 20,600 tons in 1985. 

Livestock and Poultry 

Animal husbandry accounted for about 13 percent of the gross 
value of agricultural production in the early 1980s. Water buffalo 
and cattle remained the chief draft animals for cultivation, although 
tractors were playing an increasing role in some areas, as in the 
maize- growing regions of the central plain. Buffalo, predominantly 
of the swamp type well suited to paddy culture, were estimated 
at between 5.5 and 7.2 million. Able to flourish on coarse fodder 
and roughage indigestible by other livestock, buffalo were found 
in all farming areas; even very small paddy farmers usually had 
at least one animal. After maturing, buffalo were used as draft 
animals for five or six years, or until too old to work, when they 
were slaughtered and sold for meat. Cattle, numbering between 
4.9 and 5.5 million, were used mainly for upland plowing and haul- 
ing carts. About 70 percent of all farms had cattle. Although 30 
percent of farms had three or more head, there were few herds of 
more than 10 animals. Cattle also were slaughtered for meat once 
their usefulness had ended. 

Pigs were an important source of meat, and there were about 
5 million in the early 1980s. Most farmers raised one or two, and 
an estimated 150,000 families were engaged in commercial pig rais- 
ing. Weather conditions were generally unsuitable for using horses 
except in the North, where the common variety was the so-called 
Yunnan pony mainly valued as a pack animal. Tame elephants 
remained important to the forest industry in the 1980s, especially 
in harvesting teak, where the use of mechanical equipment was 
economically prohibitive because of the wide dispersal of individual 
trees. 

Livestock reproduction rates were low because most animals were 
bred only when it did not interfere with work. In addition, debilitat- 
ing diseases, including foot-and-mouth disease, were endemic to 
all regions except the South. These diseases retarded expansion 
of the national herd of livestock, which was reported to be growing 
at only about 2.5 percent annually in the early 1980s. Shortages 
of meat in Bangkok in the early 1970s led to student demonstra- 
tions and the establishment of export quotas in early 1974 (in early 
1979 the quotas were 35,000 head of cattle and 15,000 of buffalo 
annually). Several commercial dairy herds and smallholder dairy 



160 



The Economy 



cooperatives furnished some milk for sale. Demand for fresh milk 
and dairy products had grown, especially in Bangkok. 

Almost all smallholders raised some chickens and ducks for eggs 
and meat. The commercial production of chickens grew dramati- 
cally in the 1970s, and nearly 65,000 tons of frozen chickens were 
exported in 1986, of which 95 percent went to Japan. A consider- 
able number of commercial operations had flocks of over 20,000. 
Select breeding stock was used, and modern operational practices 
were followed. Commercial duck farms were almost entirely 
Chinese operated. 

Fisheries 

In the 1980s, the fisheries sector was of major importance to the 
economy as an earner of foreign exchange, marine products 
accounting for about 10 percent of total exports in 1986. Fish also 
accounted for about three-fifths of the protein in the national diet 
and an even higher proportion among the poorer rural population. 
Until the early 1960s, the country had been a net importer of fish. 
This situation completely changed with the introduction of trawl 
fishing, which resulted in a dramatic rise in the marine catch from 
146,000 tons in 1960 to 1 million tons in 1968 and 2.1 million tons 
in 1985. Thailand became the third largest marine fishing nation 
in Asia after Japan and China. Of Thailand's 40,000 fishing ves- 
sels, nearly 20,000 were deep-sea trawlers, many with modern com- 
munication and navigation equipment and refrigeration facilities. 

By 1980 large-scale fishing operations, based largely in urban 
areas, were responsible for 88 percent of Thailand's annual catch. 
The fishing industry was the economic backbone of many Thai 
coastal cities. The increase in the catch of shrimp was particularly 
notable, and shrimp exports became a major source of foreign 
exchange earnings. By about 1972 maximum exploitation of 
demersal (bottom-dwelling) and pelagic (open-sea) fish appeared 
to have been reached in the Gulf of Thailand and in the Andaman 
Sea. In the early 1980s, production remained relatively static, and 
there was growing concern that these areas were being overfished. 

Government control of fishing was limited. The use of certain 
kinds of fishing gear within three kilometers of the coast was banned, 
but there appeared to be no restriction on trawl net-mesh size, and 
undersized commercial food fish were being caught and dumped 
in with trash fish in the production of fishmeal. Moreover, during 
the 1970s neighboring Cambodia claimed territorial waters extend- 
ing to 200 nautical miles from its coast. This reduced the area in 
the Gulf of Thailand available to Thai fishermen and increased 



161 



Thailand: A Country Study 

the intensity of fishing off the coast of Thailand. Similar claims 
by Burma had also restricted Thai fishing in the Andaman Sea. 

Inland fisheries, which included both freshwater and brackish 
water fish, officially reported annual catches of about 160,000 tons 
in the early 1980s. The actual catch — principally freshwater fish 
from flooded rice paddies, swamps, irrigation and drainage ditches, 
canals, reservoirs, rivers, lakes, and ponds — was estimated to be 
much higher. It was believed, however, to be declining as popula- 
tion growth resulted in overfishing and as increasing water pollu- 
tion from industrial waste, insecticides, and siltation caused by forest 
destruction took its toll. 

The most promising course for maintenance of fisheries produc- 
tion at the level attained in the 1970s, or for increasing output, 
was the expansion of aquaculture, including the culture of fish, 
shrimp, and various mollusks, such as mussels, oysters, and clams. 
According to the Department of Fisheries, about 4.5 million hec- 
tares of inland water areas, mostly rice paddy fields, were suitable 
for aquaculture. Another 1.3 million hectares, including estuaries, 
mangrove swamps, and tidal flats, were also usable (see table 13, 
Appendix) . 

Forestry 

An aerial photographic survey conducted in 1961 showed forests 
to cover about 54 percent (or if swamp and scrub areas are included, 
56 percent) of Thailand. In the succeeding two decades, this area 
was substantially reduced as a rapidly growing population pushed 
into the forests seeking new land for agricultural use. Increasing 
prices for certain upland crops, especially in the 1970s, also acted 
as a strong incentive for conversion of forests to cultivated lands. 
By the mid-1980s, the expansion of the cultivated area had resulted 
in a decrease in the amount of forestland to less than 30 percent. 

Except for a few small, privately owned, coastal mangrove areas, 
all forestland was the property of the state. Roughly 32 percent 
of the 1961 forest area, largely in the North and Northeast, had 
been designated permanent reserved forest through the end of the 
1960s. Government plans called for additions in subsequent years 
to raise the total to about 51 percent. Clearing or cutting of tim- 
ber or settling in such land was possible only with an official per- 
mit. Many of the stream valleys in these reserve areas, however, 
were highly suitable for agricultural use. Traditionally, farmers had 
been able to occupy unreserved public land on a free basis, restric- 
tions in such cases relating only to the cutting of certain timber 
tree species, which remained the property of the state. As popula- 
tion growth increased the demand for land, farmers in the 1970s 



162 



Fisherman with catch from inland waterway 
Courtesy United Nations 



163 



Thailand: A Country Study 

also moved into the reserved forests with little or no effective hin- 
drance from government agencies. This situation was generally non- 
reversible, and observers anticipated that eventually most such 
holdings suitable for cultivation would be legalized under the 
agricultural land reform program. 

Areas of forest usable for permanent cultivation still existed in 
the early 1980s, mostly in the South. In other regions there were 
logged-over areas, and scrubland (at times included with forestland), 
part of which could be used for agriculture. Extant forest areas — 
minus potentially cultivable land — were still considered sufficient 
to meet domestic timber and other wood requirements and also 
to provide a surplus of forest products for export. Foreign and Thai 
forestry specialists were agreed that for this situation to continue, 
positive steps would have to be taken, including an adequate pro- 
gram of reforestation, prevention of illicit cutting and the use of 
steep forest slopes for cultivation purposes, and active promotion 
of more efficient forest exploitation practices. In the early 1970s, 
the Food and Agriculture Organization recommended a reforesta- 
tion program of 1 million hectares. The government later approved 
a plan to replant 120,000 hectares. 

Major exploitation of the highly valuable teak wood for expor- 
tation was begun by European interests in the late 1800s, and by 
1895 indiscriminate cutting had largely exhausted the more easily 
workable stands. About this time, the government established a 
system of control that included leases and cutting cycles (a teak 
tree takes from 80 to 150 years to mature fully, depending on local 
soils and weather). By 1909, when controls were further tightened, 
almost all of the industry was in European hands, mainly British 
but also Danish and French. During World War II, a Thai com- 
pany took over all concessions, and although a few were returned 
to foreign control for a period after the war, the government's long- 
term goal of full Thai operation was attained in the late 1950s. 

Although modern logging equipment was in widespread use, 
difficult terrain and lack of roads in many areas necessitated the 
use of elephants in logging operations. In 1982 there were 12,000 
working elephants in Thailand, including those trained at the Royal 
Forestry Department's Young Elephant Training Center. 

The exploitation of Thailand's forests was the responsibility of 
the Royal Forestry Department. Through the Forest Industry 
Organization, a state-owned enterprise, the government controlled 
nearly all extraction of mature teak. However, illegal felling of teak 
continued to be a serious problem in the 1980s, although the extent 
of the cutting was uncertain. A decade earlier, estimates had placed 
illegal cutting at from one-third to an amount greater than legal 



164 



The Economy 



cutting. Some idea of the magnitude of the situation was evident 
in a 1973 report of the Royal Forestry Department, which cited 
some 7,600 incidents of illegal teak felling. The department was 
not only unable to patrol adequately all forest areas but authori- 
ties also failed to act against illegal logging operations connected 
with politically influential individuals and families. 

Major damage to permanent forest areas also occurred, espe- 
cially in the 1970s and 1980s, through occupation of hillside forest- 
land that was not suitable for cultivation. This practice was carried 
on throughout the country and resulted not only in destruction of 
forests but also in erosion and damage to watersheds. Notable forest 
destruction occurred over time in the North because of shifting cul- 
tivation practiced mainly by the hill peoples of the region. Of the 
roughly 70 percent of this region classified as forests, well over a 
quarter was being used for such cultivation in the late 1960s, accord- 
ing to a government report. The amount grew tremendously dur- 
ing the 1970s as the population of the hill peoples increased. In 
addition, many landless Thai were reported to have migrated to 
the area, and others who were farming agricultural land in the val- 
leys also were practicing shifting cultivation on the hills and moun- 
tainsides to supplement production. According to some sources, 
forested lands in the Northeast declined from about 60 percent in 
1956 to less than 20 percent two decades later. 

Although teak had been a major long-term source of foreign 
exchange earnings, the output by volume of timber from other com- 
mercially valuable species was far greater. Thailand had a large 
number of such species, of which the most commonly exported one 
wasyang, related to the so-called Philippine mahoganies. Others 
were of great value domestically, supplying the country's general 
requirements for timber and wood products of various sorts. In 
the 1980s, however, the forests failed to meet the demand for raw 
materials for paper and paper products, and these were being im- 
ported in growing quantities. Only limited stands of pine existed, 
and development of a domestic pulp and paper industry appeared 
to depend on the establishment of suitable forest plantations. 

Mining 

Thailand's mineral reserves had not been well assessed in the 
1980s. Mining and quarrying accounted for only a small share of 
GDP, in 1986 amounting to about 2 percent of the total in real 
terms. About thirty minerals were exploited commercially, but 
many were of minor significance. Tin, tungsten, fluorite, and 
precious stones were important foreign exchange earners in the 
early 1980s and so, to a lesser extent, was antimony. Minerals of 



165 



Thailand: A Country Study 



substantial value to the domestic economy included lignite, gyp- 
sum, salt (which was also exported), iron ore, lead, manganese, 
limestone, and marble. 

Tin was the leading mineral. The existence of tin in the area 
of present-day Thailand was known at least by the thirteenth cen- 
tury, when it was alloyed with copper in casting bronze images 
of the Buddha. In the 1980s, major workings were located in the 
southern peninsula, although deposits were also found and worked 
in several other parts of the country. The ore was obtained from 
onshore alluvial deposits, weathered and disintegrated formations, 
river beds, and offshore deposits along the seacoasts. 

Production of tin concentrates averaged over 29,000 tons annu- 
ally in the early 1970s, dropped to about 22,000 tons in the 
mid-1970s, and then rose to 46,000 tons in 1980. By 1985 tin 
production had dropped to about 23,000 tons as a result of export 
controls imposed by the International Tin Council and the indefinite 
closing of a major offshore mining company. The actual output 
of concentrates in the 1980s was believed to have been at least 10 
percent higher than officially reported. The additional quantity 
represented tin concentrates smuggled from the country to escape 
payment of both business taxes and the statutory royalty deducted 
from the price paid to the seller by the foreign-controlled Thailand 
Smelting and Refining Company (THAISARCO). The export of 
tin ore and concentrates was banned by the government after 
THAISARCO began smelting tin in 1965 at a newly constructed 
plant on Phuket Island. Most of the smuggled concentrates origi- 
nally went to Penang, but this trade had been largely halted by 
the Malaysian authorities; in the 1980s, the illegal ore was sent 
to Singapore for smelting. 

Since the mid-1970s, the tin-mining industry has generated a 
large amount of political controversy, social unrest, and illegal 
activity that continued into the mid-1980s. Onshore mining oper- 
ations were carried on mostly by small miners who were 
predominantly Thai. Offshore operations included a number of 
large dredges owned by both Thai enterprises and foreign firms, 
as well as thousands of suction boats. Both kinds of operations were 
supposed to be registered with local provincial authorities. The tin 
fields had attracted large numbers of the unemployed or persons 
seeking fortunes, however, who mined illegally. Reports of a new 
tin strike brought thousands of individuals to the area, resulting 
in such attendant social problems as claim jumping, forged regis- 
tration certificates, frequent violence, and the like. In 1975 the 
government-owned Offshore Mining Organization (OMO) was set 
up to replace large offshore oil concessions owned by foreign 



166 



The Economy 



corporations and ousted Thai government leaders. A substantial 
amount of illegal dredging was also reported in the OMO conces- 
sion area, whose size and restrictions of exploitation to sub- 
concessionaires had created strong resentment among independent 
small operators, even though the OMO had given concession 
rights to a considerable number of them. In late 1979, a group of 
nonconcession-holding small dredgers pressed the provincial 
authorities of the area to urge the central government to revoke 
all restrictions on mining in the OMO holdings. The overall mag- 
nitude of illegal operations appeared in the early 1980s to be beyond 
the ability of the local authorities to control. Official action, 
moreover, was often deterred by public sympathy for the poor per- 
son struggling to eke out a living. 

Thus, illegal mining was an important source of employment 
in the southern peninsula and, in conjunction with related illegal 
operations, created numerous ancillary jobs. From the national 
viewpoint, however, a great loss of natural wealth occurred because 
of haphazard and inefficient exploitation. Onshore miners, legal 
and illegal, tended to take out only the readily accessible richer 
ore, leaving varying amounts of lower-grade ore that, mined 
separately, was uneconomic. Large numbers of small dredges sent 
divers down to find rich spots that were sucked up, avoiding large 
nearby areas containing ore that was costly to mine. Many of the 
dredges also had poor separation equipment, and considerable 
quantities of ore were lost in the tailings. Because of potential 
political problems, decisive action by the central government (or 
provincial governments) to resolve this problem did not appear im- 
minent in the late 1980s. 

Thailand is a rich source of sapphire, ruby, zircon, garnet, beryl, 
quartz, and jadeite, and in 1986 gems and jewelry were a large 
export item in terms of value. Significant deposits of rubies were 
located in Chanthaburi and Trat provinces in the southern part 
of the Center, and deposits of sapphire were found in Kanchanaburi 
Province. Stones were also imported from Sri Lanka, Australia, 
Africa, and South America for cutting and setting into jewelry. 
By the mid-1980s, Thailand had become one of the world's major 
gemcutting centers, and the craftsmanship of Thai gemcutters was 
widely recognized. 

Tungsten, an important source of foreign exchange earnings 
beginning in the early 1970s, was found in the mountains in the 
North and in the Bilauktaung Range along the Burmese border. 
In 1970 a major find of the tungsten mineral wolframite was made 
in Nakhon Si Thammarat Province in the South. Antimony, also 
an important export, was found in many parts of the country. 



167 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Mining was carried on almost entirely by small operators, but in 
the mid-1970s cumulative annual production was about 6 percent 
of total world output. Fluorite, one of Thailand's principal exports, 
was mined mainly in the North in Chiang Mai and Lamphun 
provinces, where large reserves existed. Relatively large deposits 
of rock salt of approximately 97 percent purity underlay areas in 
the Northeast. Reserves were estimated to be at least 2 billion tons. 
Although having great future export potential, the lack of an ade- 
quate transportation infrastructure posed a major problem for 
exploitation of the rock salt reserves. 

Offering a hopeful promise of a new source of foreign exchange 
earnings and savings on imports in the 1980s was the long-delayed 
development of zinc mining and refining. This involved exploita- 
tion of a large ore deposit, estimated at 3.5 million tons of 25 per- 
cent content, at Mae Sot in Tak Province near the Burmese border. 
A zinc smelter constructed by a Thai-Belgian consortium began 
operation in 1984. 

Transportation 

Thailand's transportation system of inland waterways, railroads, 
and roads was centered on Bangkok (see fig. 11). Historically, 
waterways had served to carry agricultural products from the cen- 
tral plain to the capital for export or domestic processing and to 
transport foreign or locally made goods back to rural areas. In the 
1980s, the railroads and roads radiating from the city to all parts 
of the country served the same purpose. Bangkok's accessibility 
through the Chao Phraya made it the chief port for foreign ocean- 
borne trade. Since World War II, Bangkok's strategic location in 
Southeast Asia has made the city the principal regional center for 
international air travel. 

The existing system of main roads, railroads, and waterways in 
the late 1980s was considered by foreign experts to be generally 
adequate for the country's overall transport requirements. Con- 
siderable upgrading of provincial roads would be needed in the com- 
ing decade to handle growing traffic as commercialization spread 
through the rural areas. In particular, substantial improvement 
and development were required for subsidiary roads to provide vil- 
lages and hamlets access to the main transport arteries. 

Inland Waterways 

Historically, about 4,000 kilometers of inland waterways con- 
sisting of the rivers and canals of the central plain and the Chao 
Phraya Delta formed the backbone of the transportation system. 
Although in the twentieth century railroads and roads assumed a 



168 



\ 



v 



Uttaradit 



f 



Mae Sot 



Phitsanulok 



/ 



Nong Khai 

[ft* 

[Loei Udon 
Thar, 



'Khor, 
Kaenf 



Sakon Nakhon 



Nakhorry 
Sawan 



Ta Khli 



Naktfon 
Ratchasime 



\ 



Andaman 
Sea 



\ 

j 

^Phetcha 
1 

BURMA^ 

/i 



Bangkok^ 
Thon 

Burt $ MSiRacha 

laem Chabang 

Sattahip 1 ^ 1 

Chanthaburi 



A 



Aranyaprat 



Prachuap 
Khiri Khan 



'* I? 

C/ ^"stPl Suan, 



/Khanor, 
/ 



guff of 

Tfiaifancf 



, Suraf 
Thani 



Nakhon Si 
Thammarat 



*Phuket 
o 



y^Songkhla 
Pattani 



<=0 



CA! 



Belongs^ "^St^ 

MALAYSIA 



25 50 



25 



/'Ygwre 77. Transportation System, 1987 



170 



The Economy 



dominant position in the central plain, waterways still carried a 
sizable portion of the total traffic. Waterborne freight, chiefly con- 
sisting of rice, accounted for about 17 percent of total freight trans- 
ported countrywide in the 1980s. Large numbers of small craft also 
transported passengers. During the rainy season about 1 ,600 kilo- 
meters of waterways were navigable by barges of up to 80 tons and 
1.8-meter draft, which could travel from the Gulf of Thailand to 
as far north as Uttaradit. Navigation was reduced to about 1,100 
kilometers of waterways in the dry season, and traffic could navigate 
only to Nakhon Sawan, roughly halfway to Uttaradit. Shallow-draft 
vessels could navigate the interconnected network of canals through- 
out the year, and Bangkok, Ayutthaya, and other towns had float- 
ing markets where a great deal of trading activity took place. Some 
sections of the Mekong River were also navigable. 

Railroads 

The state-operated national rail system was started by King 
Chulalongkorn, and the first section — from Bangkok to Ayutthaya — 
was inaugurated in 1896. The line was extended to Nakhon 
Ratchasima in 1910, and during the first decade of the century 
work had already begun on other lines to the north and south. By 
1941 well over four-fifths of the present-day rail system had been 
opened. 

After 1951 control of the railroads was vested by law in the State 
Railway of Thailand (SRT), an autonomous agency. Through 1979 
SRT had received a number of assistance loans from the World 
Bank, as well as bilateral aid with which the line was first rehabili- 
tated and later modernized, including replacement of steam locomo- 
tives by diesel units. In the early 1980s, SRT had about 4,000 
kilometers of meter-gauge track, all of it single track except for a 
90-kilometer section of double track running north of Bangkok to 
near Ayutthaya. Four main interconnecting lines originating in 
Bangkok ran to Chiang Mai (Northern Line), Aranyaprathet 
(Eastern Line), Nong Khai and Ubon Ratchathani (Northeastern 
Line), and the Malaysian border (Southern Line). A number of 
branch lines were also in operation, including a line constructed 
in the 1980s to link the Lan Krabu oil field in Kamphaeng Phet 
Province to the Northern Line. Also under construction in the 
mid-1980s was a link from Bangkok down the eastern seaboard 
to Rayong, which was completed as far as Sattahip in 1984. 

Competition from developing road services had cut heavily into 
railroad passenger and freight traffic, and the proportional share 
of freight declined between 1968 and 1976 from 19 percent to 11 
percent. In the 1980s, however, the rail lines remained of major 



171 



Thailand: A Country Study 

importance in the transport of bulk commodities, such as petro- 
leum products, cement, and rice, over long distances. 

Roads 

Extensive development of the road network did not start until 
after World War II. By the 1980s, however, roads were the most 
important part of the transportation system. Before the war the 
few existing roads had been intended primarily as feeders to the 
railroad system, which had been built largely with foreign funds 
that needed to be repaid. Profit from rail transportation was vital, 
and the construction of competing roads was deemed uneconomic. 
From the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s, however, substantial United 
States aid was provided, along with technical assistance, to develop 
a national highway system that by 1965 totaled almost 9,500 kilo- 
meters. Thereafter, assistance for highway development came 
mainly from the World Bank, although in the late 1960s United 
States military forces also furnished substantial funds for road con- 
struction. 

In the 1980s, the primary road system consisted of a net of 
national highways that started at Bangkok and extended in all direc- 
tions to the country's frontiers. They totaled about 20,000 kilo- 
meters, of which well over 90 percent were paved. Provincial roads 
totaling over 24,000 kilometers formed a secondary system that 
tied provincial towns and population centers to the national roads. 
About two-fifths were unimproved and often impassable during 
rainy weather. In addition to the main and provincial roads, there 
were tertiary roads — consisting of village roads, footpaths, tracks, 
and the like — variously estimated at from 40,000 to 60,000 kilo- 
meters. These roads and trails were important because they 
represented in many cases the only link between a village or ham- 
let and the provincial system or possibly a railroad stop or inland 
waterway point. Several thousand kilometers of tertiary roads had 
been improved, but in general they were poorly maintained. Their 
administration was spread over a number of government agencies, 
in contrast to national and provincial roads, which were admin- 
istered by the Department of Highways in the Ministry of Com- 
munications. 

In the early 1980s, no restrictions existed on the importation of 
motor vehicles, although taxes and duties on imported vehicles were 
higher as a measure to protect the domestic automobile assembly 
industry. Under guidelines set in 1986, local automobile assembly 
plants were required to use at least 54 percent domestic parts. Motor 
vehicles registered in 1984 included 688,000 automobiles, 600,000 
commercial vehicles, and nearly 2 million motorcycles. In the 1980s, 



172 



The Economy 



about a third of all vehicles registered were in the Bangkok 
metropolitan area, but this included almost two-thirds of the auto- 
mobiles. The relatively massive concentration of trucks, buses, and 
automobiles in the capital area regularly created enormous traffic 
jams. Construction of an elevated expressway was under way, the 
first part of which had been completed by the early 1980s. 

Ports and Shipping 

The country's preeminent port was Bangkok, which in the early 
1980s handled 98 percent of imports and 65 percent of exports as 
well as about 40 percent of coastal traffic. More than 4,000 for- 
eign vessels were reported to have called at Bangkok in 1983, and 
about 24 million tons of cargo were handled, including coastal cargo. 
Two other ports of some significance in international trade were 
Si Racha and Sattahip, both located southeast of Bangkok on the 
Gulf of Thailand. Both ports were used primarily for exporting 
agricultural products. Sattahip 's deep-water naval facility was also 
used to handle imports of heavy equipment. 

The port of Bangkok had experienced continuous growth since 
the 1950s, and, through loans from the World Bank, its facilities 
had been substantially expanded to handle the increased traffic. 
A major drawback of the port was its limitation on vessel size and 
draft, which forced ships of more than 10,000 tons or 8.5-meter 
draft to offload at the mouth of the Chao Phraya, some 27 kilo- 
meters downstream. As part of the Eastern Seaboard Development 
Program, the government in 1986 approved plans to build a new 
deep-water port at Laem Chabang in Chon Buri Province to sup- 
plement Bangkok's Khlong Toei port. An industrial estate was to 
be built close to the port area for export-oriented industries, such 
as electronics, and for agro-based industries, such as food process- 
ing and rubber products. Under the same program, a new port 
and industrial park was to be constructed at Mapthaphut to serve 
the petrochemical, fertilizer, and soda ash industries. 

Some thirty smaller ports were found along the Gulf of Thailand 
and the Andaman Sea. About half were fishing ports, and the 
remainder served multiple purposes, including coastal services, 
export and import functions, and fisheries operations. Coastal oper- 
ations were in general small. In the early 1980s, the government 
also had under consideration development of deep-water ports at 
Songkhla on the east coast of the peninsula, through which rubber 
was exported, and Phuket on the west coast. Phuket served as an 
outlet for both tin and rubber exports. 

In 1985 the Thai merchant fleet consisted of 71 freighters, 2 bulk 
carriers, and 25 tankers, totaling roughly 700,000 tons. Regular 



173 



Thailand: A Country Study 

cargo service was provided between Thailand and Japan, and one 
shipping company made regular calls at West European ports. An 
unknown number of small coastal vessels conducted trade with 
Malaysia and Singapore. 

Civil Aviation 

Domestic air service was furnished by Thai Airways Company 
(TAC), a government-owned entity established in 1951. There were 
some 130 airfields of all categories throughout the provinces, 104 
of which were in usable condition, in addition to the major airport 
at Bangkok. In the early 1980s, service was provided to about twenty 
airports. In addition to domestic service, TAC also flew to Penang 
in Malaysia, Vientiane in Laos, and Hanoi in Vietnam. The prin- 
cipal Thai-flag international service was provided by Thai Airways 
International (THAI), founded in 1959 by TAC jointly with the 
Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS); TAC held 70 percent of the 
shares and SAS 30 percent. THAI's routes included flights to Asia, 
the Middle East, Europe, North America, and Australia. Approx- 
imately thirty international airlines flew into Thailand. Both TAC 
and THAI had greatly expanded and upgraded their fleets by the 
mid-1980s. In 1985 THAI placed orders with the European air- 
craft manufacturing consortium Airbus Industrie for four A300-600 
medium-range jumbo jets, making the airline the third largest Air- 
bus user in the world, with sixteen airplanes. Also in 1985, THAI 
ordered two more Boeing 747s, making a total of eight, for use 
on its long-distance routes to Europe, North America, and Aus- 
tralia. In 1987 Prime Minister Prem Tinsulanonda approved the 
proposed merger of THAI and TAC , which was expected to be 
carried out by 1989. 

The principal international airport was Don Muang outside 
Bangkok. The airport had long been Southeast Asia's main air 
traffic center for flights between Asia and Europe (although at the 
beginning of the 1980s it was experiencing strong competition from 
Singapore). The airport was used jointly by civilian airlines and 
the Royal Thai Air Force, resulting in growing congestion as in- 
ternational flights increased. During the mid-1970s, consideration 
was given to building a new civilian airport, but in 1978 a deci- 
sion was made to move some military operations to other airports. 
A two-year expansion program for Don Muang was then initiated, 
and a new state enterprise, the Airport Authority of Thailand 
(AAT), was legislated and took over administration of the airport 
in July 1979. In 1979 the airport at Chiang Mai was upgraded to 
become an international airport. In 1985 THAI opened a new cargo 
terminal at Don Muang International Airport as part of its plan 



174 



The Economy 



to expand its cargo business. That same year a new wide-body air- 
craft maintenance center was inaugurated at Don Muang as a bid 
to make Bangkok a regional service center for Airbus and Boeing 
planes. 

Energy 

Historically, the population has had adequate supplies of fuel 
in the form of wood charcoal, which was usually available for the 
taking from nearby forests and thickets. Until the mid- twentieth 
century, the chief energy source for the country's limited industry 
was wood, supplemented by rice husks and bagasse (the dry pulp 
remaining from sugarcane after the juice is extracted). Even into 
the 1960s, wood was a major source of fuel for the railroads. Elec- 
tricity, which was used for power beginning in 1887 with the es- 
tablishment of the Siam Electric Company, was generated as late 
as the early 1950s largely by steam produced through burning rice 
husks. Other natural energy sources existed, although they were 
underexploited, in the large hydroelectric potential of the Chao 
Phraya and to a lesser extent of the Mae Klong and other smaller 
rivers. There were also deposits of lignite, which was used to fuel 
a number of power plants. Since 1950 small oil deposits have been 
found and exploited in the North. Oil shales have also been dis- 
covered, but exploitation remained economically unfeasible in 1980. 
The greatest potential for domestic hydrocarbon production in the 
late 1980s consisted of large natural gas deposits, which had been 
discovered in the 1970s in the Gulf of Thailand. 

Electric Power 

As industry revived and began to expand after World War II, 
the need for electricity grew. The supply was limited and unrelia- 
ble, and some industrial firms and businesses installed their own 
generators, mostly fueled by imported oil. In 1958 the Metropoli- 
tan Electricity Authority (MEA) was established to generate and 
supply power to Bangkok and adjacent provinces. A year earlier 
the government had also set up the Yanhee Electricity Authority 
(renamed in 1969 the Electricity Generating Authority of 
Thailand — EG AT) to promote development of hydroelectric power. 
The first hydroelectric generating facility was the Phumiphon Dam. 
Completed in 1964 on the Mae Nam Ping, it had an installed 
capacity of 420 megawatts in 1979 and a potential of 560 megawatts. 

Escalating power demand led to construction of a major oil-fired 
plant, the North Bangkok Power Station, which went into opera- 
tion in 1961. Installed capacity from 1968 totaled 237 megawatts. 
The capital area became adequately supplied with the construction 



175 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of a new oil-fired plant in Bangkok. The South Bangkok Thermal 
Power Plant started up in late 1970 with a 200-megawatt capaci- 
ty; by 1977 this was increased to 1,300 megawatts. The country's 
second major hydroelectric plant, at the Sirikit Dam (potential 
generating capacity of 500 megawatts) on the Mae Nam Nan, a 
major tributary of the Chao Phraya, started generation with an 
installed capacity of 375 megawatts in 1974. A third large hydro- 
electric facility, part of a multipurpose irrigation, flood control, 
and power project at Ban Pho on the Mae Nam Mae Klong north- 
west of Kanchanaburi, was completed in the 1980s with an initial 
capacity of 360 megawatts and an estimated potential of 720 
megawatts. 

Generating capacity to other parts of Thailand was on a much 
smaller and regionally unequal scale. Increased oil prices in the 
1970s stimulated a new interest in lignite, and a lignite-fueled plant 
installed at Mae Mo, the site of a major lignite deposit, was produc- 
ing 825 megawatts by 1987. Lignite reserves were estimated to be 
865 million tons in 1985. In the South a lignite-fired plant at Krabi 
with an installed capacity of sixty megawatts commenced genera- 
tion in 1964. A major purpose of this plant was to furnish power 
for tin mines in the area and the tin smelter on Phuket Island, in 
addition to meeting local needs. In 1968 additional generating 
capacity was installed on Phuket through a ten-megawatt-capacity 
diesel plant, and between 1971 and 1977 three gas turbine units 
totaling forty-five megawatts were installed on Hat Yai. In the late 
1970s, three additional gas turbine units having a combined capacity 
of forty-five megawatts were also located at Surat Thani. 

Development of power facilities in the Northeast received little 
attention until the mid-1960s, at which time the region had an esti- 
mated generating capacity provided by small diesel units of perhaps 
one megawatt. By the early 1970s, however, four hydroelectric 
plants had been installed at dams in different parts of the region, 
with an installed capacity of ninety-five megawatts. New gas tur- 
bines furnished an additional thirty megawatts, and diesel units 
produced an additional four megawatts. 

In 1987 the power sector was composed of three government- 
owned enterprises: EGAT, under the Office of the Prime Minister, 
was the national power production agency; MEA, under the Minis- 
try of Interior had responsibility for power distribution in Bang- 
kok and the provinces immediately around the city; and the 
Provincial Electricity Authority (PEA), also under the Ministry of 
Interior, distributed power throughout the rest of the country. 
There were also a number of privately held distribution franchises 
that bought power from PEA or EGAT. Some privately owned 



176 




Multipurpose dam on the Pattani River in southern Thailand 

Courtesy World Bank 



177 



Thailand: A Country Study 

industries also generated their own power. Installed generating 
capacity in 1986 was 7,570 megawatts, of which 70 percent was 
thermal and 30 percent hydropower. In 1985 industry used nearly 
50 percent of the 20 million megawatt-hours of energy consumed. 
Residential consumption was 25 percent, commercial establishments 
used 25 percent, and street lighting and miscellaneous uses 
accounted for less than 1 percent. By the end of 1986, nearly 43,000 
villages of the more than 48,000 throughout the country had been 
supplied with power. It was projected that 95 percent of all vil- 
lages would have electricity by 1991 and essentially all villages by 
1999. 

Petroleum and Natural Gas 

Oil was discovered near Fang in the far north of the country 
in the early 1950s, but by the late 1970s the principal field was 
reported close to depletion. Onshore deposits were believed to exist 
in other parts of the country, and several foreign firms had explo- 
ration concessions in the 1980s. Exploration in the 1970s in the 
Gulf of Thailand uncovered oil in limited quantities. Oil shales were 
found at Mae Sot in Tak Province in the North. Surveys in the 
mid-1970s indicated a reserve of about 2.5 billion tons. A smaller 
deposit, estimated at about 15 million tons, existed in Lamphun 
Province, also in the North. Surveys in the Northeast from the 
mid-1970s showed the existence of about 2.5 billion tons of oil shale 
in that region. Although 4 million barrels of petroleum were 
produced in 1983, extensive commercial exploitation still seemed 
remote because of comparatively high production costs. 

In the early 1980s, petroleum products provided about 68 per- 
cent of the annual energy requirement. The country was highly 
dependent on petroleum imports, and increasing world petroleum 
prices had a serious impact on the country's balance of payments. 
In 1980 there were three large, privately operated, oil refineries 
having a combined design capacity of 165,000 barrels per day (bpd); 
government sources estimated maximum capacity at 188,000 bpd. 
The Thailand Oil Refining Company (TORC) started operations 
in the mid-1960s with a capacity of 42,000 bpd. This was expanded 
to 65,000 bpd in 1971 under an agreement whereby the entire oper- 
ation was to become the property of the Thai government in 1981. 
A second fully integrated plant was government owned but was 
leased for operation to the private Summit Industrial Corporation; 
the lease was due to expire in 1990. This plant had a design capac- 
ity of 65,000 bpd. A third plant was owned and operated by Esso 
Standard of Thailand and could handle 35,000 bpd. A very small 



178 



The Economy 



1,000 bpd plant was operated in the far north by the Ministry of 
Defense to refine domestic oil produced in the area. 

Natural gas was found by international firms in offshore con- 
cessions in the Gulf of Thailand in the mid-1970s, and subsequent 
explorations determined that large quantities were recoverable, 
sufficient to alter favorably Thailand's energy position. By 1979 
two major gas fields had been generally delineated, one located 
approximately 425 kilometers south of a proposed pipeline termi- 
nal east of Sattahip at the upper end of the gulf, the other 1 70 kilo- 
meters farther south. Proven recoverable reserves in the first field 
were estimated at nearly 1.6 trillion cubic feet and probable recover- 
able reserves at 220 billion cubic feet. In the second field, proven 
recoverable reserves were 1.3 trillion cubic feet and probable 
reserves 4.5 trillion cubic feet. Two smaller fields about 365 kilo- 
meters south of the terminal site were estimated to have about 500 
billion cubic feet of recoverable reserves. The country's total proven 
reserves of natural gas were estimated at 8.5 trillion cubic feet in 
1984. Thailand's production of natural gas in 1987 was 162.3 bil- 
lion cubic feet. 

In late 1979, the World Bank approved a loan of US$107 mil- 
lion to the Petroleum Authority of Thailand, a state enterprise, 
to assist in the first-phase exploitation of the discoveries. A sub- 
marine pipeline was built from the terminal near Mapthaphut to 
a production platform at the major field 425 kilometers south in 
the gulf. When completed in the early 1980s, it was the world's 
longest submarine pipeline. Additional pipelines were built to trans- 
port the gas overland, initially to the South Bangkok Thermal Power 
Plant and later to a new thermal power plant at Bang Pakong 
southeast of Bangkok, built in the early 1980s under EGAT's 
1978-85 power generation development plan. Gas was also dis- 
tributed to industrial users along the pipeline route. 

Telecommunications 

Two major entities were responsible for the Thai telecommuni- 
cation and postal services under the supervision of the Ministry 
of Communications. The Telephone Organization of Thailand 
(TOT) was responsible for the domestic telephone services; for in- 
ternational telephone services to several neighboring countries, such 
as Malaysia and Laos; and for leasing circuits for domestic point- 
to-point transmission of voices, telegraph, radio, and television. 
The Communication Authority of Thailand (CAT) was responsi- 
ble for postal service, international telephone service to countries 
not served by TOT, all telegraph and telex services international 
lease circuits, domestic radio-telephone links to some isolated areas, 



179 



Thailand: A Country Study 

and telephotographic and facsimile services. A committee in the 
Ministry of Communications coordinated the services and invest- 
ment of TOT and CAT, although the two were state-owned autono- 
mous operations. Numerous government agencies and large private 
industrial and commercial entities operated their own radio- 
telephone networks. 

By the mid-1980s, Thailand had an average density of one tele- 
phone per hundred inhabitants. This density was better than the 
average of 0.7 for the developing countries in the East Asia region, 
although it was still lower than Malaysia with 3.3, South Korea 
with 7.8, Taiwan with 14.6, and Singapore with 26.5. Even Bang- 
kok, which had the most developed telephone service in the coun- 
try, had only a density of 5.4 telephones per 100 inhabitants. 
Overall, only 25 percent of the population had access to telephone 
services. There were about 5,800 local and long-distance pay (coin 
box) telephones in the capital city and 750 in provincial towns. 
About 4,500 pay telephones were to be added in Bangkok and 1 ,500 
in provincial towns. About 62 percent of the country's telephone 
lines were connected to business and government subscribers and 
the rest to residential subscribers. Business lines accounted for 83 
percent of total calls and revenues. 

As a rapidly modernizing nation, Thailand in the late 1980s faced 
many problems related to the growth and expansion of its econ- 
omy. The development of its industrial base and the continuing 
need for new cultivable land placed increasing pressure on urban 
and rural areas alike. However, the abundance of the country's 
resources, the adaptability of its workforce, and the stability of its 
polity boded well for Thailand's successful transition to the role 
of newly industrialized country. 

Several studies are available on the Thai economy that furnish 
background details and analysis of the modern period since about 
1850. Particularly valuable is James C. Ingram's Economic Change 
in Thailand, 1850-1970. Further reading should include Larry 
Sternstein's Thailand: The Environment of Modernization and Wolf 
Donner's The Five Faces of Thailand. The period since the late 1960s 
has been covered in a large number of journal and magazine arti- 
cles and papers written on particular aspects of the economy. The 
Far Eastern Economic Review is a particularly valuable source. Issues 
of the Bank of Thailand's Monthly Bulletin are also useful. (For fur- 
ther information and complete citations, see Bibliography.) 



180 



Chapter 4. Government and Politics 




The royal barge, Anantanakara, with its naga (seven- headed serpent) bow, 
built during reign of King Mongkut (1851-68) 



THE RELATIVE STABILITY of the Thai political system in 
the 1980s may prove to be a political watershed in modern Thai 
history. This stability, which resulted after several decades of spas- 
modic experimentation with democracy, could be attributed to the 
growing support of the monarchy and the traditionally dominant 
military-bureaucratic elite for parliamentary democracy. Evidently 
an increasing number of educated Thai had come to believe that 
a "Thai-style democracy" headed by the king and a parliament 
representing the people through political parties was preferable to 
excessively authoritarian rule under military strongmen. The future 
of parliamentary democracy was not a certainty, however, as many 
Thai continued to believe that democratic rule was not the most 
effective option in times of incompetent national leadership, 
prolonged civil and political disorder, or external threat to inde- 
pendence. 

Under the Constitution of 1978, Thailand has a British-style 
cabinet form of government with King Bhumibol Adulyadej 
(Rama IX, 1946-) reigning as constitutional monarch and Prime 
Minister Prem Tinsulanonda heading the government. Unlike the 
British prime minister, however, Prem was not a leader of or even 
a member of any political party in the nation's parliament, the Na- 
tional Assembly, nor did he run for election in the July 1986 elec- 
tion that led to the formation of his four-party coalition government. 
This was his fifth cabinet and seventh year in office — no mean ac- 
complishment in a country that had witnessed numerous coups, 
countercoups, and attempted coups during its sporadic experiments 
with parliamentary government since 1932. 

Unlike many of his predecessors, Prem became prime minister 
in March 1980 not by a coup, the traditional route to power, but 
by consensus among key politicians. At that time he was the com- 
mander in chief of the Royal Thai Army, a post that was long con- 
sidered to be the most powerful in the country. With little dissent 
from any quarter, he succeeded Kriangsak Chomanand, who had 
resigned as prime minister amid mounting economic and political 
tensions. A group of disgruntled officers, popularly known as "the 
Young Turks," attempted coups against Prem in 1981 and 1985. 
These attempts, however, had no disruptive effect on political sta- 
bility. 

Despite these failed coups, in 1987 the military as a whole con- 
tinued to play a major role in Thai politics. Increasingly, this role 



183 



Thailand: A Country Study 

was tempered as so-called "enlightened" officers realized that a 
coup was no longer acceptable to the public and that the military 
could bring its influence to bear politically by working within the 
constitutional system. The military continued to believe, nonethe- 
less, that politics and government were too important to be left 
entirely in the hands of civilian politicians, whom they tended to 
disdain as corrupt, divisive, and inefficient. 

Barring early dissolution or resignation of his cabinet, Prem's 
mandate was scheduled to lapse in July 1990. Who would succeed 
him and, more important, how it would happen were the key ques- 
tions because of their far-reaching implications for parliamentary 
democracy in Thailand. A related question concerned the future 
role of the monarchy and whether or not it would continue to com- 
mand the reverence and loyalty of all segments of society and main- 
tain its powerful symbolism as the sole conferrer of political 
legitimacy. 

In the 1980s, a growing number of Thai favored a constitutional 
amendment requiring that only an elected member commanding 
a parliamentary majority could become prime minister. Citing 
Prem as an example, others argued that, even in the absence of 
a constitutional amendment, orderly succession was possible if a 
nationally reputable figure were acceptable to a majority of the coun- 
try 's political leaders. In any case, many observers agreed that, 
rather than imitating a foreign political model, Thailand should 
develop the political system best suited to the kingdom's particu- 
lar needs and circumstances. The quest for a so-called "Thai-style 
democracy" was still under way in 1987, although the form and 
process of such a democracy remained largely undefined. 

During the 1980s, Thailand pursued three major foreign policy 
objectives: safeguarding national security, diversifying and expand- 
ing markets for Thai exports, and establishing cordial relations with 
all nations. On the whole, Thailand conducted what it called "omni- 
directional foreign policy, ' ' and it did so in a highly pragmatic and 
flexible manner. Relations with such major powers as the United 
States, China, and Japan were increasingly cordial, and relations 
with the Soviet Union were correct. The Thai were suspicious of 
Soviet intentions because Moscow was perceived to be aiding and 
abetting Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Beginning in the 
mid-1970s, Indochina had come to be viewed as the major threat 
to Thailand's security. The normalization of relations with these 
Indochinese neighbors remained the principal unresolved issue for 
Bangkok, which continued to address the problem directly as well 
as indirectly through a regional forum called the Association of 
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). 



184 



Government and Politics 



The Constitutional Framework 

The Constitution, promulgated on December 22, 1978, is the 
country's twelfth such document since 1932, when Thailand, then 
called Siam, first became a constitutional monarchy (see 1932 Coup, 
ch. 1). Thailand's numerous constitutions resulted, in part, from 
various coup leaders revoking an old constitution and announcing 
an interim one in order to legitimize their takeover until a perma- 
nent constitution could be promulgated. Political maneuvers aimed 
at amending constitutional provisions have often shed light on the 
interplay of Thai political forces and the personalities and issues 
involved (see Political Developments, 1980-87, this ch.). 

The Constitution provides for a parliamentary form of govern- 
ment with the king as titular head of state. In theory, the monarch 
exercises popularly derived power through the National Assem- 
bly, the Council of Ministers, and the courts. In reality, power 
is wielded by the prime minister — the head of government — who 
chairs the Council of Ministers, or cabinet. 

The Constitution includes a long chapter on the rights and liber- 
ties of the people, in which are guaranteed due process of law; sanc- 
tity of the family; rights of property and inheritance; freedom from 
forced labor, except by law in times of national emergencies or 
armed hostilities; and the inviolability of the person and private 
communications. Censorship is banned except by law for the pur- 
pose of "public order or good morals, public safety, or for main- 
taining the security of the state." Also guaranteed are freedom of 
the press, freedom of speech, freedom of religious worship, and 
the right of peaceful assembly; freedom of residence and move- 
ment within the kingdom; the right to organize voluntary associa- 
tions; the right to establish a political party and engage in political 
activities within a democratic framework; and the right to petition 
against public institutions. These rights and liberties, however, are 
not to be used against the interest of "the Nation, religion, the 
King, and the Constitution." 

Affairs of state must conform to a set of principles, which, among 
other things, obligate the state to maintain the monarchy, provide 
compulsory and free education, and promote public understand- 
ing of and belief in a democratic form of government with the king 
as its head. The state is also directed to ensure that the people enjoy 
the right of self-government as prescribed by law. Other directive 
principles urge the state to encourage private economic initiatives, 
raise the economic and social status of the citizenry to the level 
of "comfortable livelihood," and secure either landownership or 
land use rights for all farmers by means of land reform or other 



185 



Thailand: A Country Study 

appropriate measures. The state is also called upon to promote cul- 
ture, environmental protection, planned parenthood, and public 
health. 

The power of the state, exercised through a centralized form of 
government, is divided into legislative, executive, and judicial 
categories. The state revolves around the king, the bicameral legis- 
lature, the cabinet, the judiciary, the local government, and the 
Constitutional Tribunal. 

The Constitution may be amended by motions introduced either 
by the cabinet or by one-third of the members of the lower house 
of the National Assembly; in the latter case, a motion must be in 
accordance with a resolution adopted by the political party to which 
the proponents of the amendment belong. This provision is designed 
to encourage responsible party politics by prohibiting motions by 
members acting in defiance of party discipline. An amendment bill 
is deliberated in three readings and must be approved by more than 
one-half of the total members of both houses. 

The interpretation of the Constitution is under the jurisdiction 
of both the National Assembly and the Constitutional Tribunal. 
Except for matters reserved for the Constitutional Tribunal, ques- 
tions relating to the power and duty of the legislature are resolved 
by the assembly sitting in joint session. The tribunal is responsi- 
ble for deciding the legality of a bill passed by the National Assem- 
bly. If at least one-fifth of the National Assembly members object 
to a given bill before it is given royal assent, they may request the 
president of either chamber to refer the disputed bill to the tribunal 
for adjudication. The prime minister also may raise an objection 
to the tribunal directly. Decisions by the Constitutional Tribunal 
are final and cannot be appealed. 

The Central Government 

In the 1980s, the governmental system remained unitary, with 
all important decisions emanating from the traditionally powerful 
bureaucratic elite in Bangkok. Composed of senior members of the 
civil and military wings of the bureaucracy, this elite dominated 
the governmental process from the national level down to the dis- 
trict level. In this process, the Ministry of Interior continued to 
play a key role as the administrative framework of the state, resisting 
reforms and changes (see fig. 12). 

The King 

The Constitution stipulates that the king is "enthroned in a posi- 
tion of revered worship" and is not to be exposed "to any sort 
of accusation or action." As ceremonial head of state, the monarch 



186 



Government and Politics 



is endowed with a formal power of assent and appointment, is above 
partisan affairs, and does not involve himself in the decision-making 
process of the government. In the 1980s, King Bhumibol Adulyadej 
remained the nation's most respected figure because he was popu- 
larly perceived to be the embodiment of religion, culture, and his- 
tory. He ensured political stability and unity by lending legitimacy 
to important government actions and, in potentially destabilizing 
situations, as during the abortive coups in 1981 and 1985, by dis- 
creetly signaling his support of the incumbent government. 

In discharging his formal duties, the king was assisted by the 
Privy Council, whose president and not more than fourteen mem- 
bers were royal appointees. These members could not hold other 
public offices, belong to political parties, or show loyalty to any 
partisan organization. Also assisting the king were the Office of 
His Majesty's Principal Private Secretary and the Bureau of the 
Royal Household, agencies responsible for organizing ceremonial 
functions and administering the finances and logistics of the royal 
palace . 

The mode of succession was set forth in the Palace Law on Suc- 
cession. In the absence of a crown prince, or if the crown prince 
declined succession, a princess could succeed, subject to parliamen- 
tary approval. When the throne became vacant, an heir was to be 
appointed by the Privy Council. Until the heir formally ascended 
the throne, the president of the Privy Council would act as regent. 
Prince Vajiralongkorn, the only son of King Bhumibol and Queen 
Sirikit, was designated as heir on December 28, 1972, at the age 
of twenty. 

National Assembly 

In the 1980s, the bicameral parliament, unable to successfully 
challenge the tradition of bureaucratic dominance over state affairs, 
was overshadowed by the executive branch. The National Assem- 
bly continued to be an instrument of cabinet rule, with its legisla- 
tive agenda issuing for the most part from the executive branch. 

Under the Constitution, the National Assembly was structured 
to accommodate both the military and civilian bureaucratic elite 
and the electorate. The influence of the traditionally powerful 
bureaucracy was channeled through the Senate, whose members 
were nominated by the prime minister for pro forma appointment 
by the king. Up to 85 percent of the Senate membership in the 
late 1980s was drawn from the armed forces and the police. The 
intent of this arrangement was to encourage the military to play 
its traditional political role through the upper house rather than 
through a coup or countercoup. 



187 



Thailand: A Country Study 



o 

z 

o 

I— co 




ES' 




;OR 


CC CC 




□j 


1AGIS1 
COL 






ENTRAI 
COI 








o 









LE 


O^ 






z 

> i- 


t- 








h- </) 








X>UR 
ST IN 














z 


LL 






CE 



188 



Government and Politics 



Senators served a term of six years, and one- third of them were 
retired every two years. Retirees could be reappointed for an 
unlimited number of terms. A senator was required to be at least 
thirty-five years of age, a Thai citizen by birth, and not a mem- 
ber of any political party. Other membership qualifications were 
broadly phrased, including the requirement that appointees have 
"knowledge and experience in various branches of learning or 
affairs which will.be useful to the administration of the state." 

House of Representatives members represented the populace. 
They were elected for a four-year term by direct suffrage and secret 
ballot at the ratio of a member to each 150,000 inhabitants. Each 
province (changwat), regardless of population, was entitied to at least 
one seat. A constituency with a population in excess of 75,000 also 
qualified for a seat. A candidate had to be at least twenty-five years 
of age, a Thai citizen by birth, and a member of a political party. 
As a rule, an election had to be held within sixty days from the 
expiration of the four-year term of the lower house. When the House 
was dissolved by royal decree (on the recommendation of the prime 
minister), a new election was required within ninety days. 

The two chambers conducted their business separately under their 
respective presidents (speakers) and vice presidents, who were 
chosen from among the membership. Under the Constitution, the 
president of the Senate was automatically the speaker of the National 
Assembly and in that capacity was empowered to play a strategic 
role in the selection of the prime minister. 

In the 1980s, lower house members demanded that their presi- 
dent, rather than the president of the upper house, have a decisive 
role in the process of selecting the prime minister. This policy was 
necessary, they said, because the House of Representatives, not 
the military-dominated Senate, collectively represented the will of 
the electorate. A bill to amend the Constitution to make the lower 
house speaker the president of the National Assembly was intro- 
duced in 1986 but failed to pass. 

In 1987 the customary role of the Senate as a major vehicle for 
the power of the bureaucracy and a counterweight to the elective 
lower house remained little changed, even though its stature seemed 
to have diminished somewhat after April 1983. At that time, cer- 
tain senatorial powers granted under temporary clauses of the Con- 
stitution expired despite the army's efforts to have these clauses 
extended (see Political Developments 1980-87, this ch.). Under 
these clauses, the Senate had had the power to deliberate jointly 
with the lower chamber on annual appropriation bills, on "an 
important bill relating to the security of the Kingdom, the Throne, 
or the national economy," and the power to vote on no-confidence 



189 



Thailand: A Country Study 

motions. The army and its political allies in parliament failed to 
have the clauses extended because of factious squabbles. If they 
had succeeded, the military's political power would have been 
enhanced greatly. 

The lapse of the transitory provisions, however, did not affect 
the Senate's power to address such matters as the appointment of 
a regent, the royal succession, reconsideration of a bill vetoed by 
the prime minister, constitutional interpretation, a declaration of 
war, the ratification of treaties, the appointment of members of 
the Constitutional Tribunal, and constitutional amendments. In 
joint sessions senators also could render their opinion on any aspect 
of affairs of state to the prime minister when requested to do so 
by the latter. Such opinion was advisory and nonbinding. 

Bills could be introduced only by the Council of Ministers or 
the members of the House of Representatives. Major legislation 
originated mostly in the cabinet, but only the lower house, with 
the prior endorsement of the prime minister, could initiate an ap- 
propriations bill. An ordinary bill had to be sponsored by a politi- 
cal party and endorsed by at least twenty party members. Bills were 
passed by a majority, the quorum being not less than one-half of 
the total members of either house in which the bills originated. 

A bill passed by the House was sent to the Senate. The Senate 
was required to act on an ordinary bill within ninety days and on 
an appropriations bill within sixty days. If the Senate failed to act 
in either case, the bill was considered to have been consented to 
by the Senate, unless the lower chamber had extended the time. 
Disagreements between the two houses were resolved by a joint 
committee. When the dispute pertained to an appropriations bill 
and the lower house voted to reaffirm the bill it had originally 
passed, the prime minister was required to present the bill to the 
king for his assent and promulgation. At that point, the prime 
minister could exercise his important legislative role. He might 
advise the king to approve or veto the bill; in the latter event, the 
National Assembly needed two-thirds of its total membership to 
override the royal objections (actually the prime minister's ob- 
jections). 

Members of the assembly, who had parliamentary immunity, 
could question formally a cabinet minister or the prime minister 
on any appropriate issue except one in which executive privilege 
was involved. A motion of no-confidence against either an 
individual minister or the cabinet en masse could be initiated only 
by members of the lower house. Such a motion required an affir- 
mative vote of at least one-half of the lower house membership. 
Senators could not take part in no-confidence debates. 



190 



Government and Politics 



Council of Ministers 

The cabinet, the center of Thai political power, consisted of forty- 
four members, including the prime minister, deputy prime 
ministers, ministers, and deputy ministers. Individually and col- 
lectively the members were accountable to the House of Represen- 
tatives and had to retain its confidence. The cabinet was required 
to resign en masse if a no-confidence motion against it was passed 
by the House. The four-party coalition cabinet formed in August 

1986 had no civil servants or active-duty military officers. Under 
the Constitution, cabinet members were not allowed to hold polit- 
ical posts as part of an effort to strengthen the political party system. 

Under the customary rules of parliamentary government, 
Thailand could have a prime minister whose party or electoral 
alliance had earned the mandate of this office outright by winning 
a majority of seats in the House of Representatives. Whether or 
not anyone would command a majority in the next election was 
uncertain, given the highly fragmented political party system. In 
any case, a public opinion survey conducted in March 1987 by 
the Social Research Institute of Chulalongkorn University showed 
that 91 percent of those interviewed in Bangkok favored an elected 
prime minister. For a requirement that the prime minister be 
elected, however, the Constitution would have to be amended. In 

1987 the Royal Command appointing the prime minister had to 
be countersigned by the president of the National Assembly, the 
leader of the military-dominated Senate, who had the power to block 
the installation of anyone unacceptable to the military establish- 
ment. Until the basic law is revised, the selection of the prime 
minister will continue to be determined by behind-the-scenes power 
brokers, including the military (especially the army), the monarchy, 
and leaders of various political parties representing business groups. 

The prime minister held the real powers of appointment and 
removal, which he exercised in the name of the king. He counter- 
signed royal decrees and wielded a wide range of executive powers, 
including the power to declare a national emergency to ensure 
"national or public safety or national economic security or to avert 
public calamity." The legality of an emergency decree had to be 
validated by the next session of the National Assembly. The prime 
minister could also proclaim or lift martial law, declare war with 
the advice and consent of parliament, and conclude peace treaties, 
armistices, and other treaties — all in the king's name. 

As of mid- 1987, the executive branch had thirteen ministerial 
portfolios: agriculture and cooperatives; commerce; communications; 
defense; education; finance; foreign affairs; industry; interior; justice; 



191 



Thailand: A Country Study 

public health; science, technology, and energy; and university 
affairs. The heads of these ministries (except for justice; science, 
technology, and energy; and university affairs) were aided by one 
or more cabinet-rank deputy ministers. Each ministry was divided 
into departments, divisions, and sections. Traditionally, the minis- 
tries of defense, interior, and finance were regarded as the most 
desirable by aspiring politicians and generals. In the 1980s, the 
ministries of agriculture and cooperatives, industry, and commu- 
nications grew in stature as the economic value of resources stead- 
ily increased. 

In 1987 the Office of the Prime Minister continued to be the 
nerve center of the government. With the assistance of several 
cabinet-rank ministers attached to the office and of the Secretariat 
of the Prime Minister, this office monitored, coordinated, and 
supervised the activities of all government agencies and state enter- 
prises. The secretariat was headed by a cabinet-rank secretary 
general, who supervised the work of sixteen agencies attached to 
the prime minister's office. Among these agencies were the Bureau 
of the Budget, the National Security Council, the Department of 
Central Intelligence, the Civil Service Commission, and the 
National Economic and Social Development Board. In August 
1986, the secretary general was also placed in charge of a new unit 
called the National Operations Center established in the Office of 
the Prime Minister to provide essential data for efficient decision 
making. Specifically, the task of the National Operations Center 
was to handle crisis management, cope with threats to internal and 
external security, and keep the prime minister informed of public 
sentiment throughout the country. 

Outside the regular administrative structure, but subject to its 
control and supervision, approximately sixty-eight state enterprises 
were engaged as of 1987 in commercial and economic activities 
of major importance. In these enterprises, the government was 
either the sole owner or the dominant partner. Managed by senior 
civil servants, retired military officers, or politicians, the state enter- 
prises permitted a major government role in virtually every facet 
of the economic life of the country. In fiscal year (FY — see Glos- 
sary) 1986, their total budget was 9 percent more than the total 
budget of the government and accounted for 65 percent of exter- 
nal public debt. The inefficiency of these enterprises continued to 
affect the government's fiscal stability. Privatization of the enter- 
prises was listed as one of the ten major programs of the country's 
Sixth Economic Development Plan, for 1987-91 (see Public 
Finance, ch. 3). 



192 



Coronation of King Bhumibol Adulyadej in 1950 
Courtesy Royal Thai Embassy 

Judiciary 

The legal system remained an amalgam of the traditional and 
the modern. In several southern provinces, for example, Islamic 
law and custom were applicable to matrimonial and inheritance 
matters among the Muslims. A large part of the modern legal sys- 
tem was made up of criminal, civil, and commercial codes adopted 
from the British and other European legal systems with some modifi- 
cations borrowed from India, Japan, China, and the United States. 
Also, an extensive body of administrative law consisted of royal 
decrees, executive orders, and ministerial regulations. 

The judiciary provided for three levels of courts: the courts of 
first instance, the Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court. The 
courts came under two separate jurisdictions. The Ministry of 
Justice appointed and supervised the administrative personnel of 
the courts and instituted reform in judicial procedures; the Judi- 
cial Service Commission, which was responsible for the indepen- 
dence of the courts, appointed, promoted, and removed judges. 
As a rule, judges retired at age sixty, but their service could be 
extended to age sixty-five. 

The country was divided into nine judicial regions, which were 
coextensive with the nine administrative regions (phag), in contrast 



193 



Thailand: A Country Study 

to the four geographic regions (North, Northeast, Center, and 
South). At the base of the judiciary system were the courts of first 
instance, most of which were formally known as provincial courts 
with unlimited civil and criminal jurisdiction. Petty civil and crimi- 
nal offenses were handled by magistrates' courts, which were 
designed to relieve the increasing burden on provincial courts. 
Offenses committed by Thai citizens on the high seas and outside 
the country were tried before the Criminal Court in Bangkok. Labor 
disputes were adjudicated by the Central Labor Court established 
in Bangkok in 1980. Offenses by persons under eighteen years of 
age were referred to the Central Juvenile Court and its counter- 
parts in several regional centers. 

The Court of Appeal in Bangkok heard cases from all lower courts 
(except the Central Labor Court) relating to civil, juvenile, crimi- 
nal, and bankruptcy matters. At least two judges were required 
to sit at each hearing. Cases of exceptional importance had to be 
heard by plenary sessions of the court. The appellate court could 
reverse, revise, or remand lower court decisions on questions of 
both law and fact. 

The Supreme Court, which was the highest court of appeal, also 
had original jurisdiction over election disputes. Although decisions 
of the court were final, in criminal cases the king could grant 
clemency. A dispute over court jurisdiction was settled by the Con- 
stitutional Tribunal. 

Local Government 

Local government comprised both regular territorial adminis- 
trative units and self-governing bodies. Local autonomy was limited, 
however, by the high degree of centralization of power. The Minis- 
try of Interior controlled the policy, personnel, and finances of the 
local units at the provincial and district levels. Field officials from 
the ministry as well as other central ministries constituted the 
majority of administrators at local levels. 

In 1987 there were seventy-three provinces (changwat), includ- 
ing the metropolitan area of Bangkok, which had provincial status 
(see fig. 8). The provinces were grouped into nine regions for 
administrative purposes. As of 1984 (the latest year for which 
information was available in 1987), the provinces were divided into 
642 districts (amphoe), 78 subdistricts (king amphoe), 7,236 communes 
(tambon), 55,746 villages (muban), 123 municipalities (tesaban), and 
729 sanitation districts (sukhaphiban) . 

The province was under a governor (phuwarachakan), who was 
assisted by one or more deputy governors, an assistant governor, 
and officials from various central ministries, which, except for the 



194 



Government and Politics 



Ministry of Foreign Affairs, maintained field staffs in the provinces 
and districts. The governor supervised the overall administration 
of the province, maintained law and order, and coordinated the 
work of ministerial field staffs. These field officials carried out the 
policies and programs of their respective ministries as line adminis- 
trators and also served as technical advisers to the governor. 
Although these officials were responsible to the governor in theory, 
in practice they reported to their own ministries in Bangkok and 
maintained communication with other province-level and district- 
level field staffs. 

The governor also was responsible for district and municipal 
administration, presiding over a provincial council composed of 
senior officials from the central ministries. The council, which served 
in an advisory capacity, met once a month to transmit central 
government directives to the district administrators. Apart from 
the council, an elected provincial assembly exercised limited legis- 
lative oversight over provincial affairs. 

District administration was under the charge of a district officer 
(nai amphor), who was appointed by the minister of interior and 
reported to the provincial governor. Larger districts could be divided 
into two or more subdistricts, each under an assistant district officer. 
The district or the subdistrict was usually the only point of contact 
between the central authority and the populace; the central govern- 
ment had no appointed civil service officials below this level. 

The district officer's duties as overseer of the laws and policies 
of the central government were extensive. He supervised the col- 
lection of taxes, kept basic registers and vital statistics, registered 
schoolchildren and aliens, administered local elections at the com- 
mune and village levels, and coordinated the activities of field offi- 
cials from Bangkok. Additionally, the district officer convened 
monthly meetings of the headmen of the communes and villages 
to inform them of government policies and instruct them on the 
implementation of these policies. As the chief magistrate of the dis- 
trict, he also was responsible for arbitration in land disputes; many 
villagers referred these disputes to the district officer rather than 
to a regular court. 

The commune was the next level below the district. An average 
of nine contiguous, natural villages were grouped into one com- 
mune, whose residents elected a headman (kamnari) from among 
the village headmen (phuyaibun) within the commune. The com- 
mune chief was not a regular government official, but because of 
his semiofficial status, he was confirmed in office by the provincial 
governor. He also was entitled to wear an official uniform and 
receive a monthly stipend. Assisted by a small locally recruited staff, 



195 



Thailand: A Country Study 

the kamnan recorded vital statistics, helped the district officer col- 
lect taxes, supervised the work of village headmen, and submitted 
periodic reports to the district officer. 

Below the commune level was the village government. Each vil- 
lage elected a headman, who generally served as the middleman 
between villagers and the district administration. The headman's 
other duties included attending meetings at the district head- 
quarters, keeping village records, arbitrating minor civil disputes, 
and serving as village peace officer. Generally the headman served 
five years or longer and received a monthly stipend. In the 1980s, 
the importance of a village headman seemed to be declining as the 
authority of the central government expanded steadily through the 
provincial and local administrations. 

Municipalities in Thailand included Bangkok, seventy-two cities 
serving as provincial capitals, and some large district towns. Accord- 
ing to the 1980 census, municipalities had a combined population 
of 7.6 million, or about 17 percent of the national total. The munici- 
palities consisted of communes, towns, and cities, depending on 
population. Municipal residents elected mayors and twelve to 
twenty-four municipal assemblymen; the assemblymen chose two 
to four councillors from among their number, who together with 
the mayors made up executive councils. 

In theory, the municipal authorities were self-governing, but in 
practice municipal government was an administrative arm of the 
central and provincial authorities. The Ministry of Interior had 
effective control over municipal affairs through the provincial 
administration, which had the authority to dissolve municipal 
assemblies and executive councils. Moreover, such key officials as 
the municipal clerk and section chiefs were recruited, assigned, and 
retired by the ministry, which also had the power to control and 
supervise the fiscal affairs of the perennially deficit-ridden munic- 
ipalities. 

Until 1985 Bangkok's governor and assemblymen were appointed 
by the central government. In November of that year, however, 
for the first time an election was held as part of the constitutionally 
mandated effort to nurture local self-government. Chamlong 
Srimuang, a former major general running as an independent, won 
the governorship by a landslide. 

At the next lower level of local government, every district had 
at least one sanitation district committee, usually in the district cap- 
ital. This committee's purpose was to provide services such as refuse 
collection, water and sewage facilities, recreation, and road main- 
tenance. The committee was run by ex-officio members headed 
by the district officer. Like municipalities, the sanitation districts 



196 



Government and Politics 



were financially and administratively dependent on the government, 
notably the district administration. 

Civil Service 

A civil service career continued in 1987 to be widely regarded 
as a desirable route to financial security, social status, and power. 
As a result, despite the universal complaint about the inadequacy 
of government salaries, and despite many well-paid jobs becom- 
ing available in the commercial and industrial sectors, the civil ser- 
vice continued to attract many of the most promising young men 
and women. 

Personnel administration was in theory centralized under the 
Civil Service Commission, which reported to the prime minister. 
In actuality the commission's functions were limited to standardi- 
zation, general guidance, coordination, and record keeping. 
Recruitment, assignment, promotion, and discipline were handled 
by each ministry and other public entities. After 1975 government 
service was divided into eleven position classifications. The top five 
grades (seven through eleven) were "special grade officers" — the 
elite of the civilian wing of the bureaucracy. Entry level for col- 
lege graduates was grade two, and, for those with master's degrees, 
grade three. Ordinarily, the district officer was either grade five 
or six, and the district section head was grade three. The provin- 
cial governor, deputy governors, and assistant governors were spe- 
cial grade officials, as were mid- to top-level managerial officers 
of the central ministries. Provincial section chiefs were grade four. 

An informative study by Thai political scientist Likhit Dhiravegin 
revealed that as of 1977 the Ministry of Interior had the largest 
bloc of special and first grade officials (29 percent and 26 percent, 
respectively) because of its role as the backbone of the country's 
far-flung administrative system. This study indicated that the 
administrative service continued to be elitist, dominated by fami- 
lies of government officials and businessmen. In 1977, although 
these families accounted for only 10 percent (1 percent and 9 per- 
cent, respectively) of the national population, they claimed 41 per- 
cent and 33 percent, respectively, of the special grade category and 
31 percent and 27 percent, respectively, of the first grade category. 
This meant that these families produced a combined total of 74 
percent of the special grade officers and 58 percent of the first grade 
functionaries. 

Geographically, a strong bias favored the Center (including Bang- 
kok), which had 32 percent of the total population but had 68 per- 
cent and 63 percent, respectively, of the special and first grade 
officers assigned there; Bangkok alone had 39 percent and 33 



197 



Thailand: A Country Study 

percent of these two categories. In terms of male-female ratio, of 
the special grade and first grade officers, only 11 percent and 23 
percent, respectively, were women. Many of the female officers 
were in the ministries of university affairs, education, and public 
health. Likhit pointed out that, insignificant as it might seem, the 
number of women in managerial positions was impressively high 
when compared with other Asian countries. 

In terms of education, about 93 percent and 77 percent of the 
civil servants in the special and first grade categories, respectively, 
had college educations, which compared favorably with other Asian 
countries such as Japan, the Republic of Korea (South Korea), 
Singapore, and Burma. The Likhit study also showed that 33 per- 
cent and 20 percent of the elite categories had foreign training, the 
United States accounting for 71 percent and 78 percent and Brit- 
ain for 11 percent and 9 percent. The British-United States con- 
nection was attributable to Thailand's close relationship with Britain 
before World War II and with the United States since that time. 

According to the Likhit study, foreign influence was least evi- 
dent in the ministries of interior, justice, and public health — 
ministries that had the largest number of locally trained civil ser- 
vice officials at the elite level. Most of the locally trained senior 
judges, public prosecutors, lawyers, district officers, and provincial 
governors were graduates of Thammasat University. In the 1980s, 
several other Thai universities were expected to have an increased 
share of graduates applying for government service. 

Civil service promotion was based on merit, but many observers 
believed that favoritism was an important factor in career 
advancement. A civil servant normally retired at age sixty. In 1980, 
however, the law was changed to permit extension of tenure up 
to age sixty-five in cases of extreme necessity for the benefit of the 
country. 

The Media 

In the mid-1980s, the media played an important role as the prin- 
cipal source of domestic and foreign news and, to a lesser degree, 
as a source of public entertainment. All major daily newspapers 
were privately owned, but radio and television stations were con- 
trolled by the government and operated as commercial enterprises. 
Newspapers were generally regarded as more credible than the 
government-controlled broadcast media. 

Mass media were under the broad supervision of the Public 
Relations Department in the Office of the Prime Minister. This 
department served as the principal source of news and informa- 
tion about the government and its policies. It issued daily news 



198 




,,,, ,,«»« MfH »»♦?? fffff 




in m - tp * iBf 



Throne Hall (Anantasamakom), 
the assembly hall for the Thai government 
Courtesy National Archives 



bulletins on domestic and foreign affairs for use by the print and 
electronic media. News bulletins were also issued by other govern- 
ment agencies, including the Thai News Agency, established in 
1976 under the Mass Communications Organization of Thailand, 
a state enterprise under the Office of the Prime Minister. The Thai 
News Agency concentrated mostly on domestic affairs; foreign news 
was gathered from international wire services, which maintained 
offices or representatives in Bangkok. 

The Constitution guarantees freedom of the press, which may 
not be curbed except by law "for the purpose of maintaining the 
security of state or safeguarding the liberties, dignity or reputa- 
tion of other persons or maintaining public order or good morals 
or preventing deterioration of the mind or health of the public." 
Most observers agreed that the Thai press enjoyed considerable 
freedom. Nevertheless, in the 1980s editorial writers and report- 
ers continued to exercise self-censorship, mindful that there were 
unwritten but real government constraints, especially on coverage 
relating to the monarchy, government affairs, internal security mat- 
ters, and Thailand's international image. The existing statutes gave 
broad powers to the director general of the Thailand National Police 
Department, including the authority to revoke or suspend the license 
of an offending publication. The severity of penalties varied, 



199 



Thailand: A Country Study 



depending on the political climate and the sensitivity of an issue. 
In 1987 a new press bill was pending before the National Assem- 
bly, the intent of which was to give the press as much autonomy 
as possible except in time of war or in a state of emergency, in 
which case the press officer would be allowed to exercise censorship. 

Daily newspapers were concentrated heavily in Bangkok, where 
at least 65 percent of the adults read a daily paper, compared with 
about 10 percent in rural areas. Newspapers were generally 
independent, and many were financially solvent, deriving their 
income from sales and advertising. The government was forbid- 
den by law to subsidize private newspapers. Foreign ownership of 
newspapers was also banned as a safeguard against undue foreign 
or subversive influence. 

In the 1980s, Thai journalistic standards improved steadily, as 
reflected in the print media's growing emphasis on political and 
economic issues, as well as on major foreign news events. This could 
be attributed to the emergence of a more discriminating reader- 
ship. On the negative side, sensationalist coverage and insufficient 
professional training continued to mar the reputation of the Thai 
press. 

There were about 150 newspapers, including 30 dailies in Bang- 
kok and 120 provincial papers in 1985. Some Bangkok dailies were 
considered to be national newspapers because of their countrywide 
distribution. Most provincial papers appeared every two, five, 
seven, or ten days. In Bangkok twenty-one dailies appeared in Thai, 
six in Chinese, and three in English. Of an estimated daily circu- 
lation of 1.6 million for all Bangkok dailies in 1985, Thai Rath 
(800,000 circulation) and the Daily News (400,000 circulation) 
together claimed about 75 percent of the total circulation. These 
two newspapers reportedly were popular among white-collar groups. 
The most successful among the remaining newspapers were Ban 
Muang, Matichon, Siam Rath, and Naew Na. The English-language 
dailies were the Bangkok Post, The Nation, and the Bangkok World, 
which were popular among the well-educated and influential mem- 
bers of Thai society and were regarded by many as more reliable 
than the Thai dailies. Some of the editorial positions on the Bang- 
kok Post and the Bangkok World were held by foreigners, mostly Brit- 
ish; The Nation, on the other hand, was almost entirely staffed by 
Thai and tended to view the world from a Thai perspective. 

Unlike the English-language dailies, whose circulation was 
increasing in the early 1980s, Chinese-language dailies were declin- 
ing in readership. Their total circulation was probably around 
70,000. Two leading Chinese-language dailies were Sing Sian Yit 
Pao and Tong Hua Yit Pao. These dailies were noted for responsible 



200 



Government and Politics 



coverage of domestic and international affairs, but they refrained 
from taking strong stands on local political questions. 

All aspects of radio and television broadcasting, such as operat- 
ing hours, content, programs, advertising, and technical require- 
ments, were set by the Broadcasting Directing Board, which was 
under the Office of the Prime Minister and headed by a deputy 
prime minister. In 1987 the country had 275 national and local 
radio stations. The Public Relations Department, under the Office 
of the Prime Minister, was responsible for Radio Thailand and 
the National Broadcasting Services of Thailand (NBT). NBT was 
the official government broadcasting station, which transmitted local 
and international news mandatorily broadcast on all stations. News 
was also broadcast daily in nine foreign languages over Radio 
Thailand's World Service. Radio stations were run also as com- 
mercial enterprises by such government agencies as the Mass Com- 
munications Organization of Thailand; units of the army, the navy, 
and the air force; the police; the ministries of communications and 
education; and several state universities. In 1985 there were 7.7 
million radio sets in use. 

As a major official channel of communication, all television sta- 
tions avoided controversial viewpoints and independent political 
comment in their programming. The Army Signal Corps and the 
Mass Communications Organization of Thailand directly operated 
television channels 5 and 9. Two other channels were operated 
under license by private groups, the Bangkok Entertainment Com- 
pany, which ran Channel 3, and the Bangkok Television Com- 
pany, in charge of Channel 7. Channel 11 was operated by the 
government primarily as an educational station. 

By 1980 television had become the dominant news medium 
among urban Thai. Household television set ownership (about 3.3 
million sets in 1984) was as widespread as radio in all urban areas 
of the country. As of 1984, television exceeded radio ownership 
in the Center and South and was about even with radio ownership 
in the North and the Northeast. Nine out of ten Bangkok house- 
holds had at least one television set. Ownership of color television 
was also widespread among urban Thai in the South (58 percent), 
Bangkok (54 percent), the Northeast (49 percent), the central plain 
(47 percent), and the North (43 percent). 

Political Developments, 1980-87 

In 1987 Thailand was stable under Prime Minister Prem's eighth 
consecutive year of administration, even though his leadership was 
criticized for alleged indecisiveness and weakness. The country had 
not experienced a successful military coup since October 1977, and 



201 



Thailand: A Country Study 

in 1987 few politically or economically destabilizing issues existed. 
As in past decades, the military continued to be influential in the 
political process. Significantly, however, "one of the most surprising 
aspects of recent Thai politics," as American political scientist Ansil 
Ramsay noted, "is that political change has occurred within a 
parliamentary framework instead of through military coups." 

In January 1980, while dismissing as obsolete the flurry of 
seasonal rumors of an imminent coup, then-Prime Minister 
Kriangsak declared that "our military officers who are pursuing 
a democratic course" would never allow it to happen. He did not, 
however, rule out a coup if there were good reason, but only as 
a last resort. He also made the point that he would step down if 
there was a majority political party run by trustworthy and effi- 
cient political party executives. 

At the end of February, Kriangsak stepped down, not, however, 
because there was a party he could trust. Rather, the factious mili- 
tary was unable to give the former army commander in chief the 
unified support he needed at the time to weather a political storm 
brought on by economic troubles. Predictably, he was succeeded 
by Prem, the army commander in chief at the time, making 
Kriangsak the first ex-military prime minister ever to give up power 
voluntarily (see table 14, Appendix). Prem survived two attempted 
coups and provided years of stability, which the country needed 
for the institutionalization of a political process based on the party 
system. The development of party politics was still under way in 
1987, albeit with occasional setbacks. 

Although Prem initially ruled through a coalition cabinet of three 
parties — the Democrat (Prachathipat) Party, the Social Action (Kit 
Sangkhom) Party, and the Chart Thai (Thai Nation) Party — his 
real political base was the armed forces, the traditional source and 
guarantor of political power (see Political Parties, this ch.). In 1980, 
as from the early 1970s, the military was divided into several cliques. 
One of the more influential cliques called itself "the Young Mili- 
tary Officers Group, ' ' popularly nicknamed "the Young Turks. ' ' 
The influential members of this group belonged to Class Seven 
(1960 graduates) of the elite Chulachomkhlao Royal Military Acade- 
my. Their aim was to enhance military professionalism as well as 
to ensure a decisive role for the military in the Thai political process. 
In 1980 their support was key to Prem's ascension to the prime 
ministership. In April 1981, however, they turned against Prem, 
who at that time was still army commander in chief. Apparently 
the Young Turks believed that Prem had betrayed their trust by 
consorting with political opportunists and party politicians in his 
coalition government and, worse yet, by taking sides with rival 



202 



Prime Minister 
Prem Tinsulanonda 
Courtesy 
Royal Thai Embassy 



military cliques opposed to the Young Turks. For two days, the 
Young Turks controlled the capital city, but they failed to win the 
monarch's tacit consent, which had been crucial to the traditional 
legitimization of a coup. Thirty-eight coup plotters — including their 
leaders, Colonel Manoon Rupekahorn and Colonel Prachak 
Sawangchit — were dismissed from the army. After the abortive 
coup, General Arthit Kamlangek, who was credited with a key role 
in thwarting the attempt, was promoted to commander of the First 
Army Region; traditionally, this post was regarded as the most stra- 
tegic one in the making of coups and countercoups (see Military 
Structure, ch. 5). It was also noticeable that Class Five (1958 gradu- 
ates) of the military academy, the Young Turks' chief rival fac- 
tion, were promoted to some key army posts. 

In August 1981 , Prem relinquished his post as army commander 
in chief but continued to head his second coalition cabinet. This 
coalition was formed in March 1981 , after a cabinet crisis brought 
on by the withdrawal of the Social Action Party from the rul- 
ing coalition. The second coalition comprised the Chart Thai Party, 
the Democrat Party, and the United Democracy (Saha Prachathi- 
patai) Party, the latter a loose alliance of minor parties. In Decem- 
ber 1981 , this cabinet was reorganized to make room for the Social 
Action Party, which decided to return to Prem's third cabinet. 

Another notable development of the year was Kriangsak's entry 
into partisan politics when he won a parliamentary by-election in 




203 



Thailand: A Country Study 

August. For this purpose, he founded the National Democracy 
(Chart Prachathipatai) Party in June. Thus, he became the first 
former army commander in chief and prime minister to enter party 
politics through the so-called front door — the parliamentary route. 
Because of his background and experience, Kriangsak was often 
mentioned as an alternative to Prem. 

Another frequently mentioned alternative was General Arthit, 
a palace favorite, whose rapid rise to the post of commander in 
chief of the army in October 1982 was unprecedented. To some 
Thai observers, outspoken Arthit was "the strongman of the 
future," destined to become the next prime minister. 

It was not unusual for a Thai general to air his views publicly 
on socioeconomic or political issues, and such utterances were often 
considered important. As political scientist John L.S. Girling noted, 
"The power and authority of the military-bureaucratic regime, 
which had been so long in existence, depended not so much on 
the physical means of coercion that it possessed ... as in the 
acceptance by extrabureaucratic elements of the inevitability of that 
power and their inability to challenge it." 

In the 1980s, the military dominance in politics, however, seemed 
to be undergoing some change, partly because the officer corps was 
not as cohesive as it had been previously and hence was less able 
to impose its will. For example, the lack of unity among the officers 
and their allies in the Senate and the political parties was largely 
to blame for the failure to amend the Constitution in 1983 (see Na- 
tional Assembly, this ch.). Factionalism continued unabated, par- 
ticularly between members of Class Seven and of Class Five of the 
Chulachomkhlao Royal Military Academy. The relative influence 
of these factions was reflected in the annual reshuffle of the mili- 
tary high command — the traditional barometer of real political 
power — announced each year in September. By 1983 the Class Five 
faction, sometimes known as the "democratic soldiers" group, 
seemed to be particularly influential. 

Another factor bearing on the military's changing political role 
was the generals' own growing perception that a coup was un- 
democratic, if not uncivilized. As a result, an increasing number 
of generals and colonels in retirement chose to involve themselves 
in party politics. In the election held on April 18, 1983, for exam- 
ple, the Chart Thai Party captured 73 of 324 seats in the House 
of Representatives — nearly twice its 1979 total (see table 15, Ap- 
pendix). Led by Major General (retired) Pramarn Adireksan, this 
party had a large number of retired military officers. After the elec- 
tion, the Chart Thai Party emerged as the top party in parliament 
with 108 seats by absorbing independents and other minor party 



204 



Government and Politics 



members. Nonetheless, it was not included in Prem's fourth coa- 
lition cabinet. This exclusion reportedly was because of the party's 
aggressive postelection maneuvers for what it claimed as the moral 
right to form a new government. Such aggressiveness antagonized 
other parties, which wanted Prem for another term as their con- 
sensus prime minister. Prem's fourth coalition consisted of four 
parties: Social Action Party, Democrat Party, Prachakorn Thai 
(Thai People) Party, and National Democracy Party (see Political 
Parties, this ch.). 

The political situation was volatile during 1984, with rumors of 
a coup, a cabinet reorganization, and a rift between Prem and 
Arthit — two of the most frequently mentioned political actors. Arthit 
continued to project a forceful image with his confrontational 
approach, a sharp contrast to Prem's low-keyed, conciliatory 
approach. Also serving as the supreme commander of the armed 
forces beginning in September 1983, Arthit at times challenged the 
propriety of important government policies. In November, for 
example, he made a televised condemnation of the government's 
policy of devaluation. Also in 1984, apparently with Arthit 's bless- 
ing, some active-duty and retired army officers pressed for 
constitutional amendments aimed at enhancing their political 
influence through the Senate and the cabinet. A showdown between 
Arthit 's camp and Prem's ruling coalition seemed imminent. Arthit 
backed off, however, urging the army officers to abandon, at least 
for the time, the drive for amendments. It appeared that the 
monarchy played a key role in defusing the tension. In this con- 
text, Thai political scientist Juree Vichit-Vadakan commented that 
the monarchy was "likely to be the single most important force 
capable of holding the country together during times of chaos and 
crisis and of assuring the viability of a democratic process in 
Thailand. With a clear commitment of the monarchy to a constitu- 
tional government, democracy Thai style ultimately may have a 
chance to take root." 

In 1985 Thailand survived another military challenge to its con- 
stitutional government in the form of an abortive coup, again led 
by Manoon, the Young Turks colonel who had engineered the un- 
successful coup in 1981. On September 9, a small band of army 
and air force officers with several hundred men and twenty-two 
tanks made a vain predawn bid for power. The coup collapsed after 
ten hours, but not before seven persons were killed and scores 
wounded. Manoon was allowed to go into exile as part of a deal 
to avert further bloodshed. Among those detained for complicity 
were Kriangsak, Prem's predecessor and leader of the National 
Democracy Party; the former army commander in chief and 



205 



Thailand: A Country Study 

supreme commander of the armed forces, General Sern Na Nakorn; 
the former deputy army commander in chief, General Yos 
Thephasdin na Ayutthaya; the former deputy supreme commander 
of the armed forces, Air Chief Marshal Krasae Intharathat; and 
the still-serving deputy supreme commander of the armed forces 
Air Chief Marshal Arun Prompthep. 

The facts surrounding the affair were still unclear as of mid- 198 7, 
but observers generally suggested two reasons for the failure of the 
coup. One was factiousness in the military. The other was the per- 
ceived obsolescence of a coup, a view shared by a widening circle 
of military officers, senior civil servants, businessmen, financiers, 
industrialists, white-collar executives, intellectuals, and, signifi- 
cantly, by the king as well. According to this perception, popular 
demand for participation and representation, whetted by the advent 
of industrialization in Thailand, could be better accommodated by 
a parliamentary government than by an authoritarian and narrowly 
based military regime. Despite the absence of a successful coup 
since 1977, however, few informed Thai seemed to believe that 
the country was on a steady course toward fuller democratic rule. 
Thai political scientist Likhit Dhiravegin observed in December 
1986, "[If] one probes deeper, one would get a feeling that despite 
the existence of the elected assembly and a Cabinet consisting of 
civilians, the final say on who should be the prime minister still 
rests mainly with the military." 

In partisan politics, the Democrat Party, the oldest and the best 
organized party, fared well. Of the seven seats at stake in five by- 
elections held in 1985, the Democrats won five, four of them in 
Bangkok, where they also captured thirty-eight seats in the elec- 
tion for the fifty-four-member city council. One of the winning 
Democrats was General Harn Linanond, a former commander of 
the Fourth Army Region who quit the army in 1984 in a dispute 
with General Arthit. In 1985 Harn, who was deputy leader of the 
Democrat Party, and his party colleagues opposed a one-year exten- 
sion of service for Arthit, who was due for retirement in Septem- 
ber 1985. The army had reportedly ordered its personnel in 
Bangkok to vote for former Lieutenant General Vitoon Yasawas, 
Harn's rival, running on the Social Action Party ticket. 

Tensions between the army and the Democrat Party also sur- 
faced in Thailand's first gubernatorial election for Bangkok in 
November 1985. This contest was won handily by former Major 
General Chamlong Srimuang, a devout Buddhist, former chief aide 
to Prem and former leader of the Class Seven military academy 
graduates. Chamlong ran as an independent but was strongly sup- 
ported by Arthit, who publicly urged his subordinates and their 



206 



The Royal Family in the early 1980s 
Courtesy Royal Family Thai Embassy 

families to vote against any party that had an antimilitary orienta- 
tion. His urging was directed particularly against the Democrat 
Party. Arthit's support would have made little difference in the 
outcome of the contest because of Chamlong's immense personal 
appeal to nearly every segment of the Bangkok electorate. 

The eventful year of 1986 augured well for the future of party 
politics. Prem's coalition overcame a minor cabinet crisis, reined 
in outspoken Arthit, held the third parliamentary election since 
1979, and improved the climate for professionalization of the mili- 
tary. At the root of the cabinet crisis was endemic factional strife 
within the Social Action Party, the senior partner in Prem's four- 
party coalition. This problem necessitated a cabinet reorganiza- 
tion in January and, worse still, caused the coalition government 
an embarrassing parliamentary defeat on a routine legislative bill. 
Facing the certainty of a major parliamentary fight over a motion 
of no-confidence against his government, Prem consulted King 
Bhumibol and dissolved the House of Representatives, with an elec- 
tion slated for July 27 — eleven months ahead of schedule. The 
political arena was explosive at that juncture, as a result of mounting 
tension between the two competing poles of power — Prem and 
Arthit. Relations between them had become steadily strained since 
Arthit's public assault on the government's fiscal and monetary 
policies in November 1984. 



207 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Another complicating factor was Arthit's decision to set up the 
army's "election-monitoring center" in connection with the forth- 
coming election, an action some Thai criticized as an unwarranted 
foray into politics. Still another complication was active lobbying 
by Arthit's loyalists to have the army commander in chief's term 
extended another year to September 1987. If these loyalists had 
had their way, the extension would have enabled them to influence 
political realignment to their advantage in 1987 — after Prem's four- 
year mandate expired in April. A new election, to be held within 
sixty days from mid- April, would have been held while the army 
was still under Arthit's direction. 

On March 24, 1986, the government announced that Arthit 
would be retired as scheduled on September 1. Then on May 27, 
the government stunned the nation by dismissing the army 
commander in chief and replacing him with General Chaovalit 
Yongchaiyut, a Prem loyalist. Prior to that, no army commander 
in chief had been fired before the expiration of his term. This unpre- 
cedented action came amid the flurry of rumors that Arthit was 
involved in behind-the-scenes maneuvers to undermine Prem's 
chances for another premiership after the July election. Arthit, 
whose largely ceremonial post as supreme commander of the armed 
forces until September 1986 was not affected by the dismissal order, 
denied any role in such maneuvers. 

Chaovalit quickly set the tone of his army leadership by promising 
to keep the military out of politics, by dissolving the army's elec- 
tion watchdog center, and by pledging military neutrality in the 
election. Later in August, the army announced that twenty-eight 
of the thirty-eight Young Turks officers cashiered in the wake of 
the abortive coup in 1981 had been reinstated to active service; 
Colonel Manoon officially remained a fugitive from prosecution. 
The reinstatement, though mostly to nonsensitive noncommand 
positions, was widely welcomed as an important step toward restor- 
ing unity in the army and improving the prospect for military 
professionalism. In the annual September reshuffle of senior mili- 
tary officials, Chaovalit strengthened his power base by appoint- 
ing Class Five graduates of the military academy to key senior 
commands. 

The July 1986 election involved the participation of 3,810 can- 
didates representing 16 parties. Candidates of the outgoing coali- 
tion parties campaigned, generally avoiding any association with 
Prem. The contest literally was wide open; no single party was 
expected to win an electoral mandate outright in the newly enlarged 
347-seat House of Representatives. As in 1983, Prem declined to 
run in this election, citing the "need to maintain my neutrality 



208 



Government and Politics 



and to let the election be held . . . free from any factor that may 
sway the people." Nevertheless, because he might again be picked 
as the compromise choice of major parties to lead the postelection 
government, the issue of an elected or nonelected prime minister 
became a focus of campaign debate. Regardless of partisanship, 
however, nearly all agreed that the austerity measures that had been 
initiated by the outgoing government should be scuttled as a major 
step toward accelerating economic recovery and boosting rural 
incomes. Evidently Bangkok's powerful banking and business 
families, who had suffered as a result of such measures since late 
1984, effectively brought their influence to bear on many candi- 
dates. The army did not intervene, but Chaovalit warned that the 
military would not stand idly by if the postelection government failed 
the people's trust. 

Predictably, no party emerged with a majority, although the 
Democrat Party captured the largest bloc of seats with 100, which 
was 44 more than it had in 1983. Most observers agreed that a 
coalition led by the Democrat Party would stand little chance of 
survival; the party had nowhere near a majority and, moreover, 
was traditionally the most outspoken critic of military involvement 
in politics. Thus, despite the lack of any ground swell for a non- 
elected prime minister, Prem again emerged as the compromise 
leader most acceptable to the army, the palace, and the major 
political parties. 

The new coalition cabinet Prem unveiled in August consisted 
of four parties, with a combined strength of 232 seats distributed 
among the Democrat Party (100), the Chart Thai Party (63), the 
Social Action Party (51), and the Rassadorn (People) Party (18). 
These four were among the seven parties that initially agreed to 
support Prem; the remaining three not in the coalition were the 
Prachakorn Thai Party (24), the Ruam Thai (Thai Unity) Party 
(19), and the Community Action (Kit Prachakhorn) Party (15). 
The three parties later formed an opposition bloc with several other 
minor parties. The United Democracy Party, which commanded 
thirty-eight seats, agreed to support the opposition bloc in voting 
against the government on an issue-by-issue basis. 

In September 1986, the fifty-four-year-old army commander in 
chief, Chaovalit, pledged his support for "the parliamentary govern- 
ment," adding that there would be "no more coups" as long as 
he was in charge of the army. Earlier, he had expressed an inten- 
tion to retire in 1988 (reaffirmed in July 1987); if he did not, he 
could remain in his post until official retirement in 1992, or 1993 
with a one-year extension of service. 



209 



Thailand: A Country Study 

On April 22, 1987, the Prem administration faced a no- 
confidence debate in parliament, the second one since October 1986. 
Eighty-four opposition members sponsored the no-confidence 
motion against the entire cabinet. However, amid allegations of 
bribery and rumors of a coup or a parliamentary dissolution, the 
censure bid failed. Fifteen of the sponsors, under heavy outside 
pressure, withdrew their names on the day the debate was sched- 
uled to take place, leaving the motion one vote shy of the mini- 
mum seventy votes. Opposition leaders vowed to resubmit another 
no-confidence motion later. 

Political Parties 

In the late 1980s, the Thai political party system continued to 
evolve, albeit spasmodically. It was at a delicate stage of transi- 
tion from its past status as an adjunct to the bureaucratic estab- 
lishment to a more substantial role as a channel for popular 
representation and a provider of top political executives. 

The concept of party politics dated back to the early 1930s, but 
its impact was generally insignificant, having been overshadowed 
by the military-bureaucratic elite. The struggle for power was nearly 
always settled by coup, and the pluralistic demands of the society 
were accommodated through either bureaucratic channels or 
patron-client connections. For decades political parties had an un- 
certain status. When they existed, they did so at the sufferance of 
generals, who abolished or revived them at will. Parties were unable 
to maintain continuity, nor could they develop a mass base. Part 
of the problem was the bad image of partisan politics, which the 
politicians brought on themselves through their unscrupulous pur- 
suit of self-interest. 

Party politics received a major impetus from the student upris- 
ing of October 1973 (see Thailand in Transition, ch. 1). Forty- 
two parties participated in the 1975 parliamentary election, and 
thirty-nine participated the following year. The freewheeling par- 
tisan politics during the so-called democratic period of 1973-76 
ended in the coup of October 1976. Kriangsak, the army com- 
mander in chief, appointed a civilian-led government, but the 
Thanin Kraivichien regime turned out to be overly repressive and 
was overthrown in 1977. Assuming the office of prime minister 
himself, Kriangsak permitted the resumption of party politics 
banned by Thanin. Of the 39 parties that took part in the April 
1979 election, 7 parties captured about 70 percent of the 301 con- 
tested seats. 

As a result of the confusion stemming from the proliferation of 
minor parties, a new political parties act was passed in July 1981 . 



210 



Government and Politics 



The act, which became effective in 1983, specified that to partici- 
pate in an election, a party must have a minimum of 5,000 mem- 
bers spread throughout the country's four geographical regions. 
In each region, at least five provinces must have members, the mini- 
mum per province being fifty. The membership requirement was 
designed to foster the development of mass-based parties catering 
to broad national interests rather than narrow, sectional interests. 
Another provision of the act stipulated that a party must put up 
candidates for at least half the total lower house seats, or 174 seats. 
As a result, in the 1983 and 1986 elections, the number of par- 
ticipating parties was reduced to fourteen and sixteen, respectively. 
In order to satisfy the legal requirements, some parties fielded can- 
didates recruited from among recent college graduates. 

In the 1980s, the country's multiparty system continued to suffer 
from traditional long-standing problems. These included organiza- 
tional frailty and lack of discipline, endemic factionalism, the 
emphasis on personalities over issues, and the politicians' penchant 
for vote-buying and influence-peddling. Parties were formed, as 
before, by well-known or wealthy individuals to promote their own 
personal, familial, parochial, or regional interests. Observers 
expressed concern that failure to improve the party system could 
result in a return to authoritarian military rule. 

The perception that political parties and politicians were unwor- 
thy of trust was widespread in 1987. However, a coup was ruled 
out by Chaovalit, the new army commander in chief, even though 
he publicly castigated politicians as venal and hypocritical. In Febru- 
ary he asserted that political parties, the Constitution, and elec- 
tions alone would not make for a genuine democracy in Thailand, 
where, he argued, the party system and elections were controlled 
by a wealthy few who used the trappings of democracy for their 
own benefit. Appearing before a parliamentary committee in April 
1987, Chaovalit maintained that to build a real Thai-style demo- 
cracy with the king as head of state, the ever- widening income dis- 
parity must be narrowed first and that at the same time political 
parties and all government entities including the military "must 
join hands and walk ahead together." 

The major Thai parties, which Chaovalit had criticized, were 
mostly right-of-center. Their numerical representation in the House 
of Representatives varied considerably from one election to another. 
Of the four ruling coalition parties in 1987, the Democrat Party 
was considered to be somewhat liberal, despite its beginning in 1946 
as a conservative, monarchist party. Seni Pramoj, prime minister 
in 1946 and again in 1976, led the party from its inception until 
1979. In 1974 the party suffered major fragmentation and lost some 



211 



Thailand: A Country Study 

key figures, including Kukrit, Seni's brother, who formed the Social 
Action Party that year. In the 1979 election, the Democrats suffered 
a major setback but rebounded in 1983. Over the years, this party 
consistently opposed military involvement in politics and actively 
sought to broaden its base of support across all social segments and 
geographical regions. In recent years, particularly after July 1986, 
the Democrats were racked by internal strife. Their leader Bhichai 
Rattakul, deputy prime minister in Prem's coalition, was recon- 
firmed in a factional showdown in January 1987. Afterward, retired 
Lieutenant Colonel Sanan Khachornprasart was named secretary 
general, in place of Veera Musikapong, whose faction had been 
backed by wealthy Bangkok businessman Chalermphan Srivikorn. 

The Chart Thai Party, sometimes called the "generals' party," 
was founded in 1974 by a group of retired generals and was led 
until July 1986 by Pramarn Adireksan, retired major general and 
former president of the Association of Thai Industries and the Thai 
Textile Association. Aggressively anticommunist, Chart Thai was 
backed by a number of prominent industrialists. After the July 1986 
election, it was led by retired General Chatichai Choonhaven, whose 
relationship with Prem was friendly. 

The Social Action Party, a 1974 offshoot of the Democrat Party, 
was led by Thai statesman Kukrit Pramoj until he stepped down 
in December 1985. The party was led thereafter by the former 
deputy party leader and minister of foreign affairs, Siddhi Savetsila, 
a retired air chief marshal. More than any other party, the Social 
Action Party was identified with a free enterprise economy. In the 
1986 election, the party suffered a severe loss, brought on in no 
small part by its own internal strife. In May 1986, a splinter fac- 
tion led by seventy-four- year-old Boontheng Thongsawasdi formed 
the United Democracy Party with financial support from big 
business — amid a spate of rumors that General Arthit was also 
among the party's behind-the scenes backers. In the July 1986 elec- 
tion and afterward, the United Democracy Party was outspokenly 
critical of the Prem administration. 

The Rassadorn Party, the fourth member of the ruling coali- 
tion, was formed only a few months before the July 1986 election; 
until May 1986 it was known as the National Union (Sahachat) 
Party. Its leader was Thienchai Sirisamphan, retired deputy army 
commander in chief. Rassadorn came to be known as a pak taharn 
(military party) because its key party posts were held by retired 
generals. Its entry into partisan politics was welcomed by many 
for providing a constructive channel for military involvement in 
parliamentary government. 



212 



Former Prime Minister 
Kukrit Pramoj 
Courtesy 
Royal Thai Embassy 




The exclusion of the United Democracy Party from the fifth coa- 
lition government was predictable in light of its anti-Prem stance. 
However, it probably came as a surprise to Samak Sundaravej, 
leader of the Prachakorn Thai Party formed in 1978, that his right- 
wing and monarchist group was not invited to join the coalition. 
Before the election, master orator Samak stated that the new 
postelection government should continue its strong military ties and 
should once again be led by outgoing Prem. In so doing, he rejected 
the suggestion that Kukrit Pramoj, who had retired from party 
politics altogether in May 1986, should head the new postelection 
regime. 

The Ruam Thai Party and the Community Action Party, both 
formed in 1986, were also among the seven parties supporting Prem 
for continued premiership; but they, too, were left out of the coa- 
lition. The leader of the Ruam Thai Party, Narong Wongwan, 
was a former member of the Social Action Party and outgoing 
minister of agriculture and cooperatives. The Community Action 
Party was led by its founder Boonchu Rojanasathien, one-time 
deputy prime minister in charge of economic affairs, ex-deputy 
leader of the Social Action Party, and former president of the Bang- 
kok Bank. 

The remaining seven parties with one or more elected House 
of Representatives members formed the "Group of Nineteen," so 
named because of their combined total of nineteen members. These 



213 



Thailand: A Country Study 

parties agreed in August 1986 to join with other noncoalition par- 
ties to form a united front in an attempt to ensure efficient and 
systematic monitoring of the government. In a crucial showdown 
over a no-confidence motion against the Prem government in April 
1987, however, the opposition bloc suffered a major political embar- 
rassment because of the last-minute defection from the censure 
debate by fifteen of its members. Boonchu, chief strategist of the 
five-member opposition leadership team, expelled five members 
from his Community Action Party for their action. 

Foreign Affairs 

Diplomacy has served Thailand well, enabling the kingdom to 
manage its foreign affairs flexibly and relatively unencumbered by 
intrusions of major foreign powers. Remarkably adaptive to shifts 
in international currents, Thailand has almost always aligned itself 
with the dominant power in the region in its effort to ensure secu- 
rity, increase trade, and preserve national independence. In the 
1980s, its primary concern was to normalize relations with Cam- 
bodia and Laos — relations that were complicated by the Vietnamese 
military presence in these countries. 

Background 

Since World War II, no single factor has shaped the style and 
substance of Thai foreign relations more than the establishment 
of a communist-run government in China in 1949. The communist 
triumph aroused a Thai fear of southward Chinese expansion, in 
which the economically powerful and ethnocentrist Chinese 
minority in Bangkok might serve as a potential fifth column. 
Chinese intervention in Korea in 1950 and growing evidence of 
clandestine communist Chinese roles in local insurgencies in 
Southeast Asia reinforced Thai resolve to act in concert with other 
anticommunist nations. The formal installation of a communist 
administration in Hanoi after the decisive defeat of the French at 
Dien Bien Phu in May 1954 set the stage for Thailand's signing 
of the Manila Pact, a collective security agreement, in September 
1954. The resulting Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), 
as the regional body was formally called, had as its members 
Australia, Britain, France, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, 
Thailand, and the United States. SEATO headquarters was in 
Bangkok. 

Nevertheless, Thailand viewed the effectiveness of collective 
security with some degree of skepticism. On March 6, 1962, in 
an attempt to allay Thai apprehensions, the United States and 
Thailand reached a new understanding under what came to be 



214 



Government and Politics 



known as the Rusk-Thanat agreement (named after then-Secretary 
of State Dean Rusk and then-Minister of Foreign Affairs Thanat 
Khoman). Under the agreement, the United States pledged that, 
in the event of aggression it would help Thailand unilaterally 
without prior agreement of all other parties to the Manila Pact. 

During the 1960s, Thailand maintained close economic and secu- 
rity ties with the United States, while at the same time striving 
to foster regional cooperation with its noncommunist neighbors. 
Its assumption was that regional solidarity and national security 
were mutually reinforcing and would provide an effective deter- 
rence to communism. In 1961 Thailand joined Malaya (since 1963, 
Malaysia) and the Philippines in launching the Association of 
Southeast Asia as a nonmilitary, nonpolitical vehicle for consulta- 
tion and mutual assistance in economic, cultural, scientific, and 
administrative matters. 

In 1967 the Association of Southeast Asia was replaced by a 
broader regional group, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations 
(ASEAN), comprising Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Sin- 
gapore, and Thailand. The members agreed to cooperate in food 
production, industry and commerce, civil aviation, shipping, 
tourism, communications, meteorology, science and technology, 
and Southeast Asian studies. Consultation and cooperation were 
to take place through an annual ministerial conference held in each 
of the five ASEAN countries in alphabetical rotation. As a result 
of the formation of the regional organization, consultation between 
Thailand and the other ASEAN countries on external problems 
increased greatly in the 1970s. 

The Thai response to the external uncertainties of the 1970s was 
a graphic demonstration of the flexibility of its foreign policy. The 
external catalyst was an apparent shift in American strategic think- 
ing with regard to China and the Vietnam conflict. The shift was 
sensed in Bangkok in the late 1960s — in March 1968, when Presi- 
dent Lyndon B . Johnson expressed his intention to seek a negotiated 
peace in Vietnam and again in July 1969, when President Richard 
M. Nixon told Thai leaders in Bangkok of his intention to lower 
the future American military profile in Asia without undertaking 
any new security obligations. At that time, Nixon reaffirmed the 
United States resolve to "honor its present commitments in 
Southeast Asia" and to continue its support of Thai efforts in the 
areas of security and economic development. Not surprisingly, in 
1968, before the "Nixon Doctrine" was proclaimed in 1969, 
Thailand hinted at its desire to open channels of communication 
with China, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North 
Korea), and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam). 



215 



Thailand: A Country Study 

These channels were considered necessary by the Thai in order 
to solve difficulties and achieve peaceful coexistence. In late 1970, 
a government committee was set up to explore the possibility of 
normalizing relations with China. 

After 1971, as the United States and China moved toward recon- 
ciliation and detente, Thai soul-searching began in earnest. In 1972 
Thailand sent sports teams to China, and in 1973 Thailand made 
overtures to Hanoi for a dialogue shortly after the United States 
and North Vietnam signed a cease-fire agreement. In 1974 a Thai 
delegation conferred with Chinese premier Zhou Enlai in Beijing 
on measures to improve bilateral relations. At that time Zhou was 
reported to have assured the Thai delegation that China would stop 
aiding communist insurgents in Thailand, while underlining his 
concern over increasing Soviet influence in Southeast Asia. In 
December 1974, the Thai government lifted a fifteen-year ban on 
trade with China. In March 1975, a month before Saigon fell, 
Thailand announced its decision to recognize and normalize diplo- 
matic relations with China. 

In the wake of communist takeovers in Phnom Penh and Saigon 
in April 1975, Thailand moved expeditiously to realign its foreign 
policy. Thailand's security ties with the United States — the pillar 
of Bangkok's foreign relations for nearly three decades — were down- 
played as part of accentuating a policy of friendship with all na- 
tions. In July 1975, the Thai revoked a military accord with the 
United States under which American troops had been allowed on 
Thai soil. Thailand also agreed with the Philippines in principle 
that SEATO, having outlived its usefulness, should be phased out 
as early as possible. The crowning moment of the policy of read- 
justment came in July 1975, when Thailand and China signed a 
formal agreement on establishing diplomatic relations. Note- 
worthy was the absence of a Chinese demand for the prior removal 
of American troops from Thailand, in striking contrast to Hanoi's 
insistence that Thailand should first renounce its policy of "collu- 
sion" with the United States before any reconciliation could take 
place. 

The normalization of relations with its Indochinese neighbors 
became pressing as refugees from Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam 
streamed across the Thai frontier, straining Thai resources and 
raising tensions in the border regions. Relations with Laos, bound 
to Thailand by a shared history, religion, ethnicity, culture, and 
language, were tense. Much of the problem centered on Laotian 
Meo tribespeople who had taken refuge in Thailand after the 
communist-led Pathet Lao forces gained control of Vientiane in 
May 1975. For years the Meo and some Thai irregular troops had 



216 



The Thai delegation to the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization 
(SEA TO) conference in Bangkok in 1955 
Courtesy National Archives 

waged clandestine operations against the Pathet Lao forces, report- 
edly with the knowledge and cooperation of the government of 
Thailand. After intermittent clashes on the Mekong River, Thailand 
in November 1975 closed the frontier with Laos, causing hardship 
in Vientiane; this action prevented oil, food, and other essential 
goods from reaching Laos through Thai territory, the historical 
transit route to the landlocked country. Tension eased somewhat 
after January 1976, when the border was reopened following Thai 
recognition of the new Laotian regime. In August 1976, the two 
countries signed an agreement on the transport of Laotian goods 
through Thailand in exchange for Thai air routes over Laos to Viet- 
nam and Hong Kong. Nonetheless, recurring border incidents led 
to a temporary Thai economic blockade of Laos in late 1977. By 
the end of the year, Laotian refugees accounted for 73,000 of about 
95,000 Indochinese refugees encamped in Thailand. 

In April 1975, Thailand was the first country in Southeast Asia 
to recognize the new regime of the communist Khmer Rouge (see 
Glossary) in Phnom Penh. In October the two countries agreed 
in principle to resume diplomatic and economic relations; the agree- 
ment was formalized in June 1976, when they also agreed to erect 
border markers in poorly defined border areas. 



217 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Meanwhile, the withdrawal of all American troops from Thailand 
by July 1976 paved the way for the Thai- Vietnamese agreement 
in August on normalizing relations. In January 1978, Bangkok and 
Hanoi signed an accord on trade and economic and technical 
cooperation, agreeing also to exchange ambassadors, reopen avia- 
tion links, resolve all problems through negotiations, and consult 
on the question of delimiting sea boundaries. Progress toward im- 
proved relations with the Indochinese states came to an abrupt halt, 
however, after Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978, and 
in January 1979 installed in Phnom Penh a new communist regime 
friendly to Hanoi. 

This invasion not only provoked a Chinese attack on Vietnam 
in February 1979 but also posed a threat to Thailand's security. 
Bangkok could no longer rely on Cambodia as a buffer against Viet- 
namese power. Bangkok was forced to assume the role of a front- 
line state against a resurgent communist Vietnam, which had 
300,000 troops in Cambodia and Laos. The Thai government began 
increasing its defense capabilities. While visiting Washington in 
February 1979, Prime Minister Kriangsak asked for and received 
reassurances of military support from the United States. His govern- 
ment also launched a major diplomatic offensive to press for the 
withdrawal of all Vietnamese forces from Cambodia and for 
continued international recognition of Democratic Kampuchea 
under Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge regime. As part of that offensive, 
Kriangsak also journeyed to Moscow in March 1979 — the first visit 
ever by a Thai prime minister — to explain the Thai position on 
the Cambodian question and to reassure the Soviets that Thailand's 
anti- Vietnamese position was neither anti-Soviet nor pro-Chinese. 
Such reassurances were believed to be necessary in view of Viet- 
namese accusations that Thailand collaborated with China and the 
United States in aiding and abetting the Khmer Rouge forces 
against the Heng Samrin regime. 

The Thai offensive, backed by Bangkok's ASEAN partners, was 
rewarded in a United Nations (UN) General Assembly resolution 
adopted in November 1979. The resolution called for immediate 
withdrawal of all foreign forces from Cambodia, asked all nations 
to refrain from interfering in, or staging acts of aggression against, 
Cambodia, and called on the UN secretary general to explore the 
possibility of an international conference on Cambodia. 

Foreign Relations since 1980 

In the 1980s, the Cambodian- Vietnamese question was a prin- 
cipal concern of Thai foreign policy makers, who found common 
cause with countries that also opposed the Vietnamese occupation 



218 



Government and Politics 



of Cambodia. Security once again became an important consider- 
ation in the determination of Bangkok's foreign policy. 

In 1979 the ASEAN members were apparently divided over the 
Cambodian- Vietnamese situation. Indonesia and Malaysia were 
reportedly more conciliatory toward Hanoi than Thailand and 
Singapore, viewing China rather than Vietnam as the principal 
threat to regional stability. Indonesia and Malaysia wanted a strong 
and stable Vietnam as a potential ally, or at least as a buffer, against 
Chinese expansionism. They were inclined to tolerate to a degree 
the Vietnamese presence in Cambodia and to recognize the Heng 
Samrin regime, provided that some Vietnamese troops were with- 
drawn from Cambodia and the political base of the regime was 
reconstituted more broadly. 

The ASEAN differences were turned aside in June 1980, when 
Vietnamese troops crossed the border into Thailand. The incur- 
sion, which coincided with an annual ASEAN ministerial confer- 
ence in Kuala Lumpur, was contrary to earlier Vietnamese 
assurances that they would not encroach on Thai territory. The 
ASEAN foreign ministers strongly condemned the incursion as "an 
act of aggression" and reaffirmed their undivided support for the 
UN resolution of November 1979. They also reaffirmed their recog- 
nition of the deposed government of Democratic Kampuchea — 
their rationale being that to recognize the Heng Samrin regime 
would be tantamount to rewarding Vietnamese aggression in Cam- 
bodia. At the first UN-sponsored international conference on Cam- 
bodia held in New York in July 1981, Thailand and its ASEAN 
allies played a key role in seeking a political settlement of the Cam- 
bodian question. The conference was attended by delegates from 
seventy-nine countries and observers from fifteen others, but it was 
boycotted by Vietnam, Laos, the Soviet Union and its allies, and 
some nonaligned nations. The conference adopted a resolution that, 
among other things, called for a cease-fire by all armed Cambodian 
factions, the withdrawal of all foreign troops under the supervi- 
sion of a UN observer group, the restoration of Cambodian 
independence, the establishment of a nonaligned and neutral Cam- 
bodia, and the establishment of an ad hoc committee compris- 
ing Japan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Senegal, Sri Lanka, Sudan, and 
Thailand to advise the UN secretary general on ways to imple- 
ment the resolution. 

Relations between Thailand and China improved steadily in the 
1980s, with Beijing sharing Bangkok's opposition to Vietnamese 
military occupation of Cambodia and affirming its support for the 
Thai and ASEAN stance on the Cambodian question. China sought 
to reassure Bangkok of its withdrawal of support for the Communist 



219 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Party of Thailand and offered military assistance to Thailand in 
the event the latter was attacked by Vietnam. In the mid-1980s, 
Chinese arms and supplies for the Khmer Rouge resistance forces 
reportedly were being shipped through Thai territory. In 1985 a 
telephone hotline was established between Thailand and China in 
an effort to coordinate their activities in the event of a major Viet- 
namese incursion into Thailand. Cordiality in Thai-Chinese rela- 
tions was evident in a military assistance agreement signed in Beijing 
in May 1987. This agreement allowed Thailand to purchase, on 
concessional terms, Chinese tanks, antiaircraft guns, missiles, 
ammunition, and armored personnel carriers. 

Despite some friction over trade issues, Thai relations with the 
United States were very close, especially from 1979 onward. The 
United States reassured its commitment to Thai security under the 
Rusk-Thanat agreement of 1962 as well as the Manila Pact of 1954. 
In addition to backing the ASEAN position on Cambodia, 
Washington steadily increased its security assistance to Thailand 
and also took part in a series of annual bilateral military exercises. 
Spurred by Vietnamese incursions in 1985 and the arrival in Viet- 
nam of Soviet-piloted MiG-23s, Thailand decided to buy twelve 
F-16 fighter-bombers from General Dynamics in the United States. 
Moreover, under an accord reached in October 1985, the two coun- 
tries began to set up a war reserve weapons stockpile on Thai soil, 
making Thailand the first country without a United States mili- 
tary base to have such a stockpile. The stockpile, subject to approval 
by the United States Congress, was to be used only in a "nation- 
threatening emergency" or to repulse possible armed invasion by 
Soviet-supported Vietnamese and other forces from Cambodia. 

Trade was an irritant in Thai- American relations, but many ob- 
servers agreed that the trade problems would not likely affect the 
long-standing friendship and cooperation between the two coun- 
tries. The United States was a major trading partner and by 1985 
had become the largest and most important export market for Thai 
goods. Thailand enjoyed a trade surplus with the United States, 
which grew from a modest US$100 million in 1983 to about US$1 
billion in 1986 (see International Trade, ch. 3). Meanwhile, there 
was growing Thai criticism that the United States had become pro- 
tectionist in trade relations with Thailand. By 1987, however, many 
informed Thai had come to believe that problems in Thai- American 
trade relations would be temporary. 

In 1987 Thailand continued to express its desire for mutually 
beneficial relations with the Soviet Union and to affirm its neu- 
trality in the Sino-Soviet rivalry. Relations with Moscow, however, 
were merely correct, if not cool, as a result of Thai apprehension 



220 



Government and Politics 



over Soviet intentions toward Southeast Asia in general and Viet- 
nam in particular. Thai concern was prompted by Moscow's 
military aid to Vietnam and its continued support of Hanoi's in- 
volvement in Cambodia. During his visit to Moscow in May 1987, 
Minister of Foreign Affairs Siddhi Savetsila of Thailand told his 
Soviet counterpart that Cambodia was "the test case" of Soviet 
intentions toward Asia and the Pacific region. He urged the Soviet 
Union to use its "immense influence and prestige" to bring about 
a quick and durable settlement of the Cambodian question. Such 
settlement, according to Siddhi, entailed an early withdrawal of 
some 140,000 Vietnamese troops from Cambodia, Cambodian 
exercise of the right of self-determination, and the formation of 
a neutral and nonaligned Cambodia posing no threat to its neigh- 
bors. At the end of the May visit, a protocol was signed establish- 
ing a Thai-Soviet trade commission. 

As Thailand and Japan celebrated the centennial of their rela- 
tionship in 1987, Japan continued to be Thailand's principal trading 
partner and largest foreign investor (see International Trade and 
Finance, ch. 3). The generally cordial relations between the two 
countries — dating back to 1887, when Japan was the first country 
to set up a foreign embassy in Bangkok — were marred in the 1970s 
and 1980s by a continuous imbalance of trade. In 1984 Thailand's 
trade deficit with Japan accounted for 62 percent of its total trade 
deficit for the year, up from 46 percent in the previous year. Japan's 
economic dominance was much criticized as exploitive and, in late 
1984, was the target of a campaign against Japanese goods launched 
by university students. The Thai government stated that such a 
campaign offered little or no solution to the deficit problem. 
Thailand's preferred solution was for Japan to open its market to 
Thai products, increase its aid and loans to Thailand, set up export- 
oriented industries in Thailand, and enhance economic coopera- 
tion through more active transfers of technology. In 1986 Thailand's 
trade deficit with Japan decreased 32 percent from the 1984 figure. 

In 1987 a major foreign policy goal for Thailand was the resto- 
ration of its traditionally cordial ties with Laos, strained since 1975, 
when Bangkok came to perceive Laos as a client state of Vietnam. 
In 1979 Thailand and Laos agreed to improve their relations by 
promoting bilateral trade and allowing free access to the Mekong 
River by border residents. Nonetheless, relations between Bang- 
kok and Vientiane continued to be tense, marred by frequent shoot- 
ing incidents on the Mekong. In 1981 Thailand banned 273 
"strategic" commodities from export or transshipment to Laos. 
In mid- 1984 armed clashes occurred over the status of three re- 
mote border villages. Laos raised this issue in the UN Security 



221 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Council, rejecting Thailand's proposal to determine the territori- 
ality of the villages through a joint or neutral survey team. Mean- 
while, one important economic link continued to be unaffected by 
political or security matters: Laos sold electricity to Thailand, earn- 
ing as much as 75 percent of its annual foreign exchange from this 
transaction. 

On the initiative of Laos, the two sides met in November 1986 
to reaffirm their commitment to the 1979 accord on neighborly re- 
lations. At about the same time, Thailand began to relax its trade 
embargo, thereby decreasing the number of banned items to sixty- 
one. Apparently, this action was taken under pressure from Thai 
businessmen, whose exports to Laos had dropped sharply from 81 
percent of the total imports of Laos in 1980 to 26 percent in 1984. 
Thai exports to Laos increased in 1985 and 1986, but the future 
of economic links between the two countries was uncertain. With 
Soviet assistance, the Laotians planned to complete by 1988 a major 
highway from Savannakhet across Laos to the Vietnamese port of 
Danang, thus lessening the traditional dependence of Laos on 
Thailand for access to the sea for foreign trade. 

In March 1987, the two sides met again to discuss matters of 
mutual concern but made no progress. Although 40,000 to 60,000 
Vietnamese troops were still present on Laotian soil, Laos continued 
to accuse Thailand of harboring its historic ambition to dominate 
the region. Moreover, Vientiane accused Bangkok of being in col- 
lusion with the United States in engaging in unfriendly acts to 
destabilize the Laotian government. The alleged acts, along with 
Thai occupation of the three "Lao villages," were stated by Vien- 
tiane to be the main barriers to improvement of Laotian-Thai re- 
lations. For its part, Thailand charged that Laos was aiding the 
Pak Mai (New Party), a small, pro- Vietnamese, Thai communist 
insurgent group that had split from the Chinese-backed Communist 
Party of Thailand in 1979. Furthermore, Thailand accused Laos 
of turning a blind eye to heroin production inside Laos and of refus- 
ing to cooperate in the suppression of narcotics trafficking between 
Laos and Thailand. In March 1987, the Bangkok Post lamented in 
an editorial, "It is strange but true that the country with which 
Thailand has just about everything to share except ideology should 
happen to be one of the hardest to deal with." 

Nevertheless, Thailand was committed to solving its problems 
with the neighboring states of Indochina — Cambodia, Laos, and 
Vietnam. The Thai flexibility in foreign policy that had enabled 
the country to avoid conquest or colonization by foreign powers 
included a dedication to maintaining good relations with all na- 
tions, great and small. Given this commitment and adaptability, 



222 



Government and Politics 



it was likely that Thailand, perhaps in concert with its ASEAN 
partners, would soon reach a mutually agreeable accommodation 
with its Indochinese neighbors. 

* * # 

Thailand: Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State by Charles F. 
Keyes is a- good general introduction to the socioeconomic and 
political setting of Thailand. Equally informative are Thailand: Society 
and Politics by John L.S. Girling, which provides an excellent per- 
spective on Thai politics from 1963 to 1977, based on the author's 
professional, as well as scholarly, experience in Thailand; Thak 
Chaloemtiar ana's Thailand: The Politics of Despotic Paternalism, which 
has an informative discussion on the dynamics of military rule from 
1947 to 1970; and Modern Thai Politics : From Village to Nation, edited 
by Clark D. Neher, a collection of useful articles dealing with Thai 
political culture and process at all levels. Political dynamics, par- 
ticularly "the actual events, people, and institutions active during 
the period of open politics" (1973-76), are given excellent treat- 
ment in Political Conflict in Thailand by David Morell and Chai-anan 
Samudavanija. 

The Thai Young Turks by Chai-anan Samudavanija is highly useful 
for understanding the role of the military in Thai politics, with par- 
ticular attention to the Class Seven (1960) graduates of the 
Chulachomkhlao Royal Military Academy. David F. Haas's Inter- 
action in the Thai Bureaucracy offers a useful discussion on the way 
district-level civil servants behave in response to the structural and 
cultural parameters of Thailand's bureaucratic polity. The Bureau- 
cratic Elite of Thailand by Likhit Dhiravegin is an insightful study 
of senior-level Thai civil servants. 

In addition, for an understanding of political events, issues, per- 
sonalities, and institutions active in the political evolutions of the 
1980s, specific articles on Thailand in the following publications 
are recommended: Southeast Asian Affairs , Asian Survey, and the an- 
nual Far Eastern Economic Review Asia Yearbook. (For further infor- 
mation and complete citations, see Bibliography.) 



223 



Chapter 5. National Security 



Scene depicting the sixteenth-century "War of the Seven White Elephants" 
in which Queen Suriyothai of Ayutthaya, disguised as a warrior, was killed 
by a Burmese spear while defending her husband, King Chakraphat 



OVER THE LAST CENTURY, Thailand has been highly suc- 
cessful in maintaining its independence and national security in 
a part of the world where dissension, struggles for power, territorial 
takeovers, armed insurgency, and war have been common. The 
Thai managed to avoid the direct colonial rule that led many other 
Southeast Asian countries into years of struggle, and they remain 
proud of their legacy of independence and wary of international 
developments they perceive as threatening. As of the late 1980s, 
the Thai had not fought a major war on their own soil since the 
eighteenth century, having avoided foreign military encroachment 
largely through adroit diplomatic maneuvering. 

The pragmatism inherent in Thai national security policy brought 
the country safely through World War II and into the postwar 
period. Rather than capitulating to the Japanese, the Thai entered 
into an alliance with them. At the same time, they maintained an 
active resistance movement that enjoyed the tolerance of the war- 
time Thai government. This lack of support for their wartime 
"ally," combined with Thai diplomatic skill, achieved a postwar 
accommodation with the victorious Allies. In the face of communist 
advances in parts of Asia after World War II, Thai leaders sought 
protection against a possible threat from China by joining other 
countries for collective security through the 1954 Manila Pact, which 
laid the groundwork for the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization 
(SEATO). SEATO's lack of military forces in the tradition of the 
stronger North Atlantic Treaty Organization, however, left Thai 
authorities apprehensive about depending on the organization. 

In 1962 the country received the added security assurance it 
sought in the form of the Rusk-Thanat agreement, which stated 
that the security obligations under the Manila Pact were bilateral 
as well as collective. The agreement confirmed a long-term pro- 
tective alliance with the United States, which supplied vast quan- 
tities of economic, internal security, and military aid. The close 
association between the two countries later facilitated United States 
use of Thai military bases and other facilities during the Second 
Indochina War (1954-75). 

In the mid-1970s, however, Thai leadership began to question 
the wisdom of depending solely on a protective alliance with the 
United States. The communists had been successful in Indochina, 
and the United States role in the region had declined, while the 
Soviet Union was increasing its support for Thailand's traditional 



227 



Thailand: A Country Study 



regional rival, Vietnam. Accordingly, Thailand established diplo- 
matic relations with China in 1975, a step that harmonized with 
the new policy of accommodation between the United States and 
China. For Thailand this pragmatic course seemed wise in view 
of the growing threat posed by Vietnam. Once again, Thai flexi- 
bility in national security matters reflected the traditional analogy 
of bamboo bending with the wind. 

Although Thai flexibility improved relations with Vietnam, the 
Thai viewed the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation in 1978 
between Hanoi and Moscow, combined with Vietnam's continued 
domination of Laos and the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia, 
as a serious threat to Thailand's national security. 

State of National Security 

Persistent armed insurgency had been viewed by a succession 
of Thai governments as the nation's greatest long-term security 
problem. In the early 1980s, although insurgent activity had been 
virtually eliminated, the Thai government continued to fear a recur- 
rence of the problem. Bounded on the west by Burma and on the 
south by Malaysia, where domestic insurgencies also plagued 
governing powers, Thailand continued to guard against the spread 
of such activity across its borders. With the threat of its own 
communist-supported insurgency lessened by the early 1980s, the 
Thai government strengthened its defenses against attack by ex- 
ternal armed forces as large contingents of Vietnamese army troops 
continued to occupy neighboring Cambodia. 

Insurgency 

By the late 1980s, armed insurgency — a national problem that 
had plagued a series of Thai governments and dominated police 
and army activities for more than twenty years — had been virtu- 
ally eliminated. From a peak strength of about 12,000 armed in- 
surgents in the late 1970s, the number of armed guerrillas and 
separatists had declined to fewer than 2,000. Careful and coordi- 
nated government efforts combining military and police actions 
with social and economic policies had succeeded in reducing the 
level of insurgency. In addition, in the 1950s the United States had 
provided extensive military aid and technical assistance to the coun- 
terinsurgency program. 

A number of insurgent elements had enjoyed fair success in the 
1970s. They included the armed Communist Party of Thailand 
(CPT), Malaysian Communist Party (MCP) guerrillas, disaffected 
hill tribes people, and Muslim separatists. Their ranks had been 
increased by an influx of youthful, idealistic supporters who turned 



228 



National Security 



to the insurgents as a result of the 1976 military coup and the con- 
servative policies of the Thanin Kraivichien government that fol- 
lowed it. By the mid-1980s, however, the government's coordinated 
counterinsurgency program had succeeded in eliminating all but 
a few small pockets of rebels. 

Foreign observers disagree on the importance of communist ideol- 
ogy to the insurgency (see Ethnic and Regional Relations, ch. 2). 
Neglect by past governments, whose primary interests and atten- 
tion were centered on the capital city of Bangkok, had alienated 
many rural inhabitants and particularly many ethnic minorities 
in peripheral areas of the country. Communist militants were able 
to exploit the discontent that grew steadily during the 1960s and 
1970s in those remote regions. 

The Thai communist movement had begun in the late 1920s. 
Dominated by ethnic Chinese, the movement also appealed to other 
neglected minorities, including the various hill tribes, the Malay, 
and the Vietnamese (see Ethnicity, Regionalism, and Language, 
ch. 2). Despite their long residence in the country, these groups 
had not been accepted by the Thai, who regarded them with sus- 
picion and distrust. In December 1942, a number of small ethnic 
communist groups merged to form the CPT under predominantly 
Chinese leadership. 

Outlawed by the Anti-Communist Act of 1933, the party began 
a clandestine existence, surfacing briefly when the act was rescinded 
in late 1946 but going underground again in 1952, when legisla- 
tion prohibiting communist political action was adopted. The 1952 
law also banned the communist-controlled Central Labor Union, 
the majority of whose 50,000 members were of mixed Chinese- 
Thai ancestry. When Sarit Thanarat took control of the govern- 
ment in October 1958, he abolished the Constitution, declared 
martial law, and intensified the government's anticommunist drives. 
Nonetheless, the CPT continued its clandestine activities in schools 
and associations that had large Chinese-Thai memberships and 
among villagers in border regions. In 1959 the party began to recruit 
and train limited numbers of Hmong hill people in the North geo- 
graphical region for use as cadres in antigovernment activities. 

The CPT also sought support in the Northeast, appealing to both 
Thai- Lao and non-Tai minorities, and among the Malay in 
southern Thailand. Promising a better future to rural peasants in 
the historically neglected Northeast, the CPT tried to exploit anti- 
government sentiments in the area, which for decades had been 
the center of political dissidence. As a result, the Thai media accused 
the international communist world of conspiring to break off fifteen 
northeastern Thai provinces and integrate them into a Greater Laos. 



229 



Thailand: A Country Study 

In the peninsular provinces adjoining the Malaysian border in the 
South the CPT sought to capitalize on Malay minority sentiments 
for a separate state or a union with Malaysia. This effort was 
enhanced by popular perceptions of Bangkok's long history of 
neglect of the socioeconomic development of the Muslim minority. 

Despite these countrywide efforts, the CPT failed to gain wide- 
spread popular support and sympathy. For one thing, the coun- 
try's long history of national independence made it difficult for the 
CPT to present itself as an anticolonial, nationalist movement — a 
tactic that had been successful in other Asian countries. The large 
influx in the 1980s of refugees from Cambodia and Vietnam, with 
their stories of hardship and repression under communist rule, 
cooled potential popular support for communism (see The 
Indochinese Refugee Question, ch. 2). For many Thai citizens a 
sense of shared language, customs, and traditions, together with 
an ingrained attachment to the king and the Buddhist religion, also 
presented a psychological barrier to adopting communist goals. 

Consequently, the principal energy for the CPT came from 
external Asian sources. As early as 1959, and particularly after the 
early 1960s, China and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North 
Vietnam) began providing Thai cadres with training, money, and 
materiel for insurgency, subversion, and terrorism. Training camps 
were set up in Vietnam, in the Pathet Lao- controlled areas of neigh- 
boring Laos, and in Yunnan Province in China. In early 1962, 
a clandestine radio station — the Voice of the People of Thailand 
(VOPT) — began broadcasting from Kunming in Yunnan, trans- 
mitting Thai-language propaganda opposing the Bangkok govern- 
ment, as did Radio Hanoi and Radio Beijing. 

In the 1960s, because of growing evidence that the CPT was 
building support structures among villagers in the Northeast, the 
government began to institute limited countermeasures designed 
to improve both the defense and the living conditions in villages 
in threatened areas. Information teams sought to identify villagers' 
problems and needs and to establish better communication with 
local authorities. Mobile development units dispatched to vulner- 
able areas attempted to establish the government's presence and 
improve its image among isolated villagers. The units were designed 
to stimulate village self-help and to meet immediate local health, 
educational, and economic needs by furnishing guidance, mate- 
rials, and tools. Failure to complete many of the projects, however, 
limited the effectiveness of the program. 

In 1964 Thai authorities further increased their countermeasures. 
As a follow-up to the mobile development unit scheme, they initiated 
an accelerated rural development program in security-sensitive 



230 



National Security 



areas, constructing roads, wells, marketplaces, health clinics, and 
schools. Despite these initial government steps, insurgent activity 
increased steadily after 1965. 

Insurgency also became much more active in the South, where 
dissidents staged ambushes and held propaganda meetings in iso- 
lated villages along the Thai-Malaysian border. Many of these rebels 
were remnants of the MCP that had been driven north across the 
border into the jungles of southern Thailand by British counterin- 
surgency action against the MCP in the late 1950s. Roving groups 
of bandits compounded the security problems in the area. The lead- 
ing Muslim separatist movement in the South after the early 1970s 
was the Pattani United Liberation Organization (PULO), whose 
objective was the formation of an independent Muslim state. PULO 
enjoyed support from radical Muslims in both southern Thailand 
and northern Malaysia. The MCP, CPT, and several Muslim 
separatist organizations, as well as opportunistic bandit groups, 
all conducted operations against Thai security forces and area 
residents. 

By the mid-1970s, the multifaceted insurgency had become a 
part of life in the kingdom. The Thai government and the United 
States had spent vast amounts of money to combat the various insur- 
gencies, but success was limited at best. When the United States 
withdrew from the counterinsurgency effort in the mid-1970s, a 
stalemate set in. The infusion of substantial funds by the United 
States (estimates for the 1951-76 period range from a low of US$100 
million to a high of US$1 billion) had failed to gain "victory." 
There had been too great a diffusion of responsibility among the 
myriad Thai and American agencies planning and carrying out 
counterinsurgency operations. In addition, the 1976 coup had sent 
as many as 5,000 students into the jungles to join the CPT. Total 
CPT strength was estimated at 12,000 armed fighters in the peak 
year of 1979. 

Beginning in the mid-1970s, the Thai government tried to 
increase the effectiveness of its counterinsurgency operations. In 
1974, in order to eliminate the customary competition for power 
among government agencies, a new coordinating and command 
agency, the Internal Security Operational Command (ISOC), was 
established directly under the military's Supreme Command. In 
1987 Prime Minister Prem Tinsulanonda took over as director of 
a reorganized ISOC, signaling an increased emphasis on political 
rather than military counterinsurgency programs. 

In the early 1980s, the operational policy of Thai counterinsur- 
gency forces had also changed. Rather than concentrating on mili- 
tary actions designed to kill insurgents, the counterinsurgency 



231 



Thailand: A Country Study 

focused on neutralizing CPT tactics by reclaiming remote areas 
and their people from control by the communists. The approach 
demanded increased and better use of coordinated civic action, 
police, and military operations. 

In 1980 the government also began a new policy addressing the 
complex political and social aspects of the insurgency problem. A 
directive from the prime minister laid out the broad political stra- 
tegy, which featured an offer of amnesty to all insurgents and a 
promise to accord them respect and security. The document also 
outlined measures to improve the social and political conditions 
that had contributed to CPT strength. A companion directive issued 
in 1982 called for a coordinated offensive against insurgent centers 
in the remote mountainous areas. King Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama 
IX, 1946-) had played a role in formulating this strategy, and his 
enthusiastic support for it quickly spread throughout the military 
and civilian agencies implementing it. 

The government's new approach — referred to as communist sup- 
pression rather than counterinsurgency — resulted in the surrender 
of more than 2,000 insurgents during the first ten months. Many 
who rallied to the government side during this period were stu- 
dents who had fled to the remote jungles and joined the CPT forces 
after the repressive action of the Thai police at Bangkok's Tham- 
masat University in early October 1976 (see Thailand in Transi- 
tion, ch. 1). Some had grown disillusioned with CPT goals and 
tactics. Others were simply tired of the hardships endured in years 
of fighting under spartan conditions in the remote countryside. 
Former student leader Thirayuth Bunmee's surrender after 5 years 
with the CPT gained wide publicity for the amnesty program, as 
did the mass defection of 250 armed insurgents and hundreds of 
unarmed family members and supporters at Mukdahan in Decem- 
ber 1982. 

At the same time, the Thai armed forces conducted selective but 
increasingly aggressive and effective operations against longtime 
guerrilla bases in the Northeast and North. The capture and 
destruction in 1981 of the Khao Khor base astride the border 
between Phetchabun and Phitsanulok provinces in the North was 
a serious blow to the insurgency. In the South, more aggressive 
Thai military operations, political and social strategy, and a series 
of combined operations with Malaysian armed forces exacted a simi- 
lar toll on the MCP, CPT, and Muslim separatists. By 1981 MCP 
strength had declined by one-third, to about 2,000. The steady 
pounding by the military and the political defections also rapidly 
depleted CPT strength. By the end of 1982, the number of armed 
CPT forces had decreased from 12,000 in 1979 to fewer than 4,000 



232 



National Security 



countrywide. The coordinated military, political, economic, and 
social strategy had proved successful. 

The phaseout of materiel support from China also weakened the 
insurgency. The rift in Sino- Vietnamese relations in Asia bene- 
fited Thailand. Beginning by closing the clandestine guerrilla radio 
station (VOPT), which had broadcast for years from Yunnan 
Province, China eventually halted virtually all support for the CPT 
and minority separatists. At the same time the CPT, plagued for 
many years by factionalism and ideological differences, was para- 
lyzed by a break between Maoists and Leninists. Faced with the 
loss of border sanctuaries in Laos and China and deprived of Cam- 
bodian sanctuaries by the Vietnamese invasion, CPT cadres faced 
ever- increasing hardship, and only the most dedicated revolution- 
aries remained in the field. Thai authorities expressed concern over 
the emergence of a small, Vietnam-oriented faction of the CPT, 
but that faction posed little threat to stability in the country. 

In mid- 198 7 the government estimated that there were about 
600 armed, active communist insurgents operating in Thailand. 
Of this number, approximately 65 to 70 were thought to be in the 
North, 85 to 115 in the Northeast, 260 to 350 in the South, and 
55 to 60 in the Center (see fig. 13). The MCP, which had been 
reduced to fewer than 1,500, operated in two factions along the 
Thai-Malaysian border. Muslim separatists — PULO and the 
smaller Barisan Revolusi Nasional (National Revolutionary 
Front) — numbered between 350 and 400 altogether. 

Although, by the late 1980s most of the insurgencies had been 
defeated, dedicated revolutionaries remained, both within Thailand 
and abroad. The government was particularly concerned about a 
new CPT strategy that stressed urban operations. Moreover, there 
had long been a suspicion that not all the heralded defectors had 
indeed renounced their communist beliefs. Nonetheless, the Thai 
government had achieved significant success in defeating an array 
of insurgents during the 1980s. 

Potential External Threats 

Having controlled the insurgencies within Thailand, in the early 
1980s the government turned to protecting the country from out- 
side aggression. Although Vietnamese forces in Cambodia were 
viewed as the primary external threat, border tensions, caused partly 
by ill-defined boundaries, between Thailand and Laos and between 
Thailand and Burma also created concern (see Boundaries, ch. 2). 
For the most part, diplomacy enabled the government to resist 
external pressures and to keep the use of armed force to a mini- 
mum, but the Vietnamese invasion and occupation of Cambodia 



233 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 13. Areas of Insurgent and Separatist Activity, 1987 



234 



National Security 



in December 1978 caused severe tension along the Thai-Cambodian 
border. The Vietnamese stationed 140,000 troops along that fron- 
tier, along with 30,000 Cambodian troops, whom they trained, 
organized, and directed. The immediate presence of heavily armed 
and capable Vietnamese divisions on its border reinforced 
Thailand's decision to improve its relations with China. In January 
1979, Prime Minister Kriangsak Chomanand of Thailand and 
senior Chinese policy makers met secretly at Thailand's Utapao 
Air Base to forge a Thai-Chinese cooperation policy. That meet- 
ing resulted in China's halting moral and materiel support for the 
CPT and establishing Thailand as a conduit for Chinese support 
to the Khmer Rouge (see Glossary) faction of the Khmer resistance 
movement. 

Thailand deployed elements of several divisions along the Cam- 
bodian border to deal with all aspects of the Vietnamese threat. 
There had been a history of strife along this border resulting from 
ethnic prejudices, poor demarcation of the boundary, and profit- 
able cross-border smuggling, but the Vietnamese invasion of Cam- 
bodia seriously aggravated the situation. Vietnamese efforts to 
eliminate Cambodian resistance forces drove thousands of refu- 
gees into areas along the Thai border (see The Indochinese Refu- 
gee Question, ch. 2). Admitting large numbers of the refugees into 
Thailand posed severe problems for Thai authorities, not only 
because providing for the refugees strained the local economy but 
also because Khmer troops and some Vietnamese soldiers disguised 
as civilian refugees infiltrated Thailand. Thai security forces 
attempted to disarm all military infiltrators and return them to 
Cambodia. 

Thailand supported Khmer resistance efforts as soon as the mag- 
nitude of the Vietnamese invasion became apparent in 1979. This 
resistance consisted of three major factions, the largest and most 
effective of which were remnants of the ousted communist Khmer 
Rouge. The noncommunist resistance groups — the forces loyal to 
Prince Norodom Sihanouk and the Khmer Peoples National Liber- 
ation Front (KPNLF) — also maintained their own armed combat- 
ants separate from the Khmer Rouge. All three groups, loosely 
aligned in the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea, 
had their headquarters and primary bases just inside Thai terri- 
tory. This situation allowed Thailand to exercise considerable con- 
trol over the forces and their operations inside Cambodia, but it 
also provided targets for Vietnamese attack. Thailand viewed 
assistance to the resistance movements as essential to Thai security 
and, along with fellow Association of Southeast Asian Nations 
(ASEAN) members, waged a highly visible campaign for 



235 



Thailand: A Country Study 

international assistance to Cambodian refugees and resistance forces 
(see Foreign Affairs, ch. 4). Assistance from China, ASEAN, the 
United States, and others was essential for continued viability of 
the Khmer resistance movement. 

Vietnamese operations against the resistance along the Thai 
border provoked numerous clashes with Thai security forces, result- 
ing in some casualties among Thai civilians living near the border, 
as well as among Thai forces. Vietnamese troops concentrated on 
trying to eliminate the Khmer resistance forces and to close 
resistance infiltration routes. They also conducted artillery attacks 
and made limited incursions, occupying small portions of Thai ter- 
ritory, notably in the border area where Thailand, Laos, and Cam- 
bodia meet. 

The pattern of conflict along the Thai-Cambodian border showed 
little change between 1979 and 1984. Vietnamese forces conducted 
offensives against the Cambodian resistance forces during the dry 
season each year and then withdrew to consolidated positions and 
internal security operations well within the interior of Cambodia 
during the rainy season. This pattern changed with the major dry 
season campaign in 1984-85. In its largest and most successful series 
of operations, Vietnamese forces eliminated most major resistance 
bases along the Thai border and inflicted casualties on both refu- 
gees and armed resistance fighters. Following that offensive, Viet- 
namese forces remained deployed along the border during the rainy 
season and attempted to seal the border against the resistance forces. 
These efforts did not seriously hamper resistance infiltration, 
although they made movement into the interior of Cambodia more 
difficult. In the late 1980s, sizable Vietnamese forces with the limited 
support of units from the Khmer People's Revolutionary Armed 
Forces (KPRAF) continued to be deployed along the border. 

Vietnam repeatedly assured Thailand and other ASEAN coun- 
tries that it had no intention of invading Thailand, and contacts 
among these parties continued sporadically for several years as they 
explored the possibility of a political solution to the Cambodian 
conflict. Vietnam stated that it intended to withdraw the bulk of 
its forces by 1990, when it would have armed and trained the 
KPRAF into a credible national army. However, in mid- 1987 
observers doubted that the Vietnamese-supported Cambodian 
government would be able to assume the burden of its own defense 
by 1990. Even if Vietnam met its self-imposed 1990 deadline, 
observers expected that, as in Laos, a number of Vietnamese troops 
would remain in Cambodia to "advise" the KPRAF and secure 
Vietnamese interests in the country. 



236 



National Security 



In mid- 1987 the 800-kilometer Thai-Cambodian border was fully 
garrisoned by Vietnamese and Cambodian forces. An estimated 
three Vietnamese divisions and two Cambodian regiments were 
deployed along the northern Cambodian border adjacent to Ubon 
Ratchathani, Surin, Buriram, and Sisaket provinces. In the tightly 
contested region between Poipet in Cambodia and Aranyaprathet 
in Thailand's Prachin Buri Province, there were parts of two Viet- 
namese divisions and three Cambodian regiments. In the former 
Khmer Rouge stronghold of the Phnom Milai Mountains south 
of Poipet, two Vietnamese divisions and one Cambodian regiment 
were deployed. From this region southward to the Gulf of Thailand, 
there were two Vietnamese divisions and three independent Viet- 
namese regiments. (A Vietnamese infantry division usually con- 
sists of about 10,500 officers and men; an independent regiment 
has a strength of about 3,000.) 

Although the situation along the Cambodian border posed the 
greatest external threat to Thai security, other areas presented 
problems as well (see fig. 14). Thailand faced security challenges 
of varying intensity in each sector of its 2,800-kilometer border with 
Burma, Laos, and Malaysia. Sporadic clashes with Laos received 
publicity but did not pose major security threats. Armed clashes 
in the mountains of Nan and Uttaradit provinces were more seri- 
ous but were contained by Thai security forces. This mountainous 
area suffered from a poorly demarcated border and was host to 
migrations of nomadic hill tribes and pockets of CPT resistance. 

Thai security concerns along the lengthy border with Burma were 
complex and vexing. The numerous Burmese separatist movements 
posed a touchy diplomatic problem for Thailand. Annual Burmese 
government military operations against Mon, Karen, and Kayah 
separatist groups resulted in wholesale border crossings by fleeing 
insurgents and refugees. Thailand, however, was able to disarm 
and control these annual migrations. More serious were the 
activities of narcotics traffickers and the private armies that provided 
security for the narcotics trade. These elements operated along the 
northwestern Thai border and until the early 1980s encountered 
only weak response from Thai security forces. Thereafter, pres- 
sure from the United States, world opinion in general, and a new 
spirit of cooperation between the Thai and Burmese governments 
on the narcotics issue began to change the situation (see Criminal 
Activity and the Narcotics Trade, this ch.). 

Faced with various threats along its borders, the Thai govern- 
ment attempted to apply the principles of its highly successful coun- 
terinsurgency program to the country's external security problems. 
Encouraged by the success that road building had had in destroying 



237 



Thailand: A Country Study 




238 



National Security 



the Khao Khor insurgent base, Thailand developed an extensive 
network of new roads along the Laotian border in Nan and 
Uttaradit provinces and along much of the length of the Burmese 
border. These roads provided easier access for security forces to 
remote border regions and served as a base for developing the local 
political, social, and economic infrastructure. Volunteer local secu- 
rity organizations established throughout the country in the 1980s 
played an important role both in containing insurgency and in 
enhancing security in border regions. Village security units were 
organized and trained by the army. Civilian agencies taught 
development techniques, safety measures, and village administra- 
tion and provided improved health, agricultural, and educational 
facilities. The Rangers were locally recruited contract paramilitary 
forces trained in counterinsurgency and border security operations. 
They often joined with the army and the Border Patrol Police (BPP) 
to form units of forty to fifty called Santi Nimitr (Dream of Peace) 
teams, which carried out community development projects in 
remote villages where CPT front activities were reported or exter- 
nal threats detected. In 1987 there were more than 200 such teams 
operating throughout the country. 

During the mid-1980s, the government continued to consolidate 
its political and military gains against insurgencies while turning 
its attention to the external threat. The government directed major 
efforts toward securing its borders, improving access to remote 
mountain regions, and strengthening domestic perceptions of the 
Vietnamese threat. The combination of army and BPP operations, 
road building and associated economic development, and resettle- 
ment resulted in a closer integration of formerly isolated areas with 
the rest of the country. 

The Armed Forces 

The Thai military establishment historically has played an 
important role in the country's national life. Composed of heter- 
ogeneous elements of regular cadres and conscripts, the armed forces 
in mid- 1987 had a total strength of approximately 273,000 officers 
and enlisted personnel on active duty. Component services included 
the Royal Thai Army of 190,000, the Royal Thai Navy of 40,000, 
and the Royal Thai Air Force of 43,000. The navy's personnel 
strength included 20,000 marines. 

The military's reputation as the center of political power mani- 
fested itself in nearly a score of coups and countercoups between 
1932 and 1987. Over the years, its role as a political instrument 
had detracted from its abilities as a professional military force. 
Doubts about the state of combat readiness had been expressed 



239 



Thailand: A Country Study 

by some members of the Thai officer corps as well as by foreign 
military observers. By the 1980s, the military had acted to increase 
the professionalism of its personnel — particularly the officer corps — 
and to modernize its units and weaponry. 

General Development 

From early times, the country's kings were, with few exceptions, 
military leaders, and the history of their reigns is replete with 
accounts of armed conflict. The Thai peasants followed their kings 
and nobles into war and then between wars returned to the land. 
The few professional retainers and mercenaries who made up the 
permanent military establishment neither enjoyed special privileges 
or prestige nor exercised any particular influence over national life. 
Military leaders were usually members or favorites of the royal 
family with an aptitude for military organization and command. 
Their authority and tenure, however, were subject to the king's 
pleasure. 

During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the Thai learned 
much from their campaigns against the Khmer and the Burmese. 
Following the Khmer example, King Trailok (1448-88) established 
administrative divisions and increased the proficiency of his army. 
A successor, Ramathibodi II (1491-1529), wrote a treatise on 
warfare and further improved Thai military capability by reorganiz- 
ing his army and instituting compulsory service. In the early six- 
teenth century, the Portuguese introduced firearms into the 
kingdom and taught the Thai the arts of casting bronze cannon 
and constructing stone fortifications. Portuguese mercenaries also 
served the king as bodyguards, armorers, and instructors in 
musketry. 

The Thai-Burmese struggle continued into the seventeenth cen- 
tury, and the exploits of King Naresuan (1590-1605) contributed 
greatly to emerging Thai military traditions. In a battle in 1593 
that secured his kingdom against an invading Burmese army, 
Naresuan killed the enemy crown prince in a famous duel in which 
the contenders were mounted on elephants. His exploits were 
recounted in later school texts as part of the country's heritage of 
courage and valor. 

King Mongkut (Rama IV, 1851-68) took the first steps toward 
the development of modern fighting forces. Under his rule and that 
of his son, King Chulalongkorn (Rama V, 1868-1910), the Thai 
were particularly receptive to Western ideas and methods. They 
established military and naval cadet schools, brought in limited 
numbers of foreign advisers, and began reorganizing the army along 
European lines. In 1894 the Ministry of Defense was formed, giving 



240 



National Security 



the military for the first time a recognized position in the govern- 
mental hierarchy. 

These developments laid the groundwork for the creation of a 
professional military officer class and for the establishment of a per- 
manent and relatively modern military organization. Although the 
king maintained complete control, princes and other high-ranking 
members of the royal family continued to hold key positions within 
the military. In 1905 a law was passed designating the crown prince 
as commander in chief of the army. In 1912 King Vajiravudh 
(Rama VI, 1910-25) established the National Defense Council, 
composed of military and civilian officials, with himself at the head. 
During this same period antimonarchist sentiment found its first 
clandestine expression in a small group of army and navy officers 
who resented the king's favoring units that served as the palace 
guard. Powerful princes of the time also indicated their displea- 
sure at the king's practice of appointing commoners to high govern- 
ment positions, including senior military posts. 

In succeeding years, Thai kings gave increasing attention to 
building a modern military establishment, which they began to use 
to further the country's international interests. In World War I 
Thailand joined the Allied Powers and sent a small contingent of 
soldiers to France. The kingdom's demonstrated ability to develop 
its own military force with only limited foreign assistance became 
an effective argument in obtaining favorable revision of treaties 
with France and Britain in the early 1920s. During this period the 
first full-fledged Thai army, a force consisting of roughly 30,000 
officers and men, was organized and trained according to Euro- 
pean military concepts and practices. 

The acceptance of Western influence by the Thai ruling elite 
at the beginning of the twentieth century significantly affected the 
role of the military. By the 1930s, many officers had attended Euro- 
pean military schools, where they learned not only modern fight- 
ing tactics but also new social concepts and political patterns. 
Similarly, many civilians who had studied abroad had become 
interested in liberalizing the governmental system. These civilian 
leaders enlisted support among the military, and the resulting coup 
d'etat in June 1932 brought about the transformation of the abso- 
lute monarchy into a constitutional government (see Beginning of 
the Constitutional Era, ch. 1). It also established the military as 
a dominant force in national political life. 

During World War II the Thai armed forces grew in strength 
to about 60,000. In the period of political instability following the 
war, however, the size of the military establishment fluctuated 
markedly. When the military elite was in power as a result of a 



241 



Thailand: A Country Study 

coup d'etat, the armed forces expanded. When countercoups 
brought civilian-led administrations, military force reductions 
followed. 

In 1950 the Thai entered into various aid agreements with the 
United States and received grants through the latter' s Military 
Assistance Program (MAP). Under this arrangement, the Thai ini- 
tiated a comprehensive modernization program based on Ameri- 
can advice, equipment, and training (see Foreign Security 
Assistance, this ch.). Two decades later these measures had trans- 
formed the Thai military into a modern armed force with greatly 
improved capabilities for national defense and internal security. 
By 1970 the armed forces had increased to approximately 155,000. 
Their growth maintained a moderate pace thereafter (see table 16, 
Appendix). 

Place in National Life 

The country's military establishment was developed essentially 
to protect and defend an ethos that is still widely upheld: adher- 
ence to the monarchy, practice of Buddhism, and devotion to one's 
country. Over the years, the armed forces have generally ensured 
a sufficient level of peace, order, and domestic security to main- 
tain political stability. In this respect the Thai military's place in 
national life has been like that of many other nations. However, 
military officers — particularly in the army — were much more deeply 
involved in the country's governmental and business operations 
than were their counterparts in most Western nations (see National 
and Urban Structures: Class and Status, ch. 2; Political Develop- 
ments, 1980-87, ch. 4). 

Seizing power in 1951, ostensibly to protect the country and its 
traditional institutions from the threat of communist influences, 
military leaders firmly reinforced the traditional Thai values of 
peace, order, and security within the political fabric of society. 
Although military control of the country gave way in succeeding 
years to democratic periods of varying lengths, the population still 
regarded the armed forces as an institution that could be relied on 
when political stability was needed. One result of this attitude was 
the persistent involvement of senior military leaders in affairs in 
which the military in Western countries usually are not allowed 
to engage. It became commonplace for high-ranking officers to pur- 
sue military careers while taking an active role in lucrative busi- 
ness activities that in turn added to their influence in national affairs. 
The military service also became for many a career that provided 
as much opportunity for political achievement as did the civil 
service. 



242 



Royal Thai Army troops inspecting shipment 
of United States military equipment in 1954 
Courtesy National Archives 

Liberal-minded observers deplored the inordinate influence the 
armed forces had on the country's sociopolitical existence. Such 
criticism focused on allegations of repressive power tactics, greed, 
and corrupt practices. Defenders of the military, however, coun- 
tered that in developing countries these abuses were minor in rela- 
tion to the armed forces' success in thwarting communist takeovers 
and ensuring stability. In the late 1980s, the military establishment 
remained an integral part of Thai society. 

The Military Roles 

From the early days of their development, the Thai armed forces 
have been primarily responsible for defending the country's territorial 
integrity against foreign aggressors. In addition, they have tradi- 
tionally served as a backup for the police in maintaining internal 
security and protecting citizens and their property. For several de- 
cades, elements of all three services have been included to varying 
degrees in military actions to contain, dispel, or crush insurgency. 

The army's main purpose was to defend the country against 
invasion by any foreign ground force. To be prepared for wartime 
tasks, the army was charged with training and equipping itself in 
peacetime in order to achieve and maintain a satisfactory state of 
combat readiness. 



243 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Although the national police frequently demonstrated their ability 
to handle isolated domestic disorders, problems generated by in- 
surgents at times required the assistance of the stronger and better 
equipped military forces, particularly the army. Throughout the 
1960s and early 1970s, a large part of the army was committed 
to counterinsurgency efforts and played a crucial role in the coor- 
dinated operations that virtually eliminated the communist insur- 
gency. At times the armed forces found themselves in competition 
with the police for control of the national counterinsurgency effort. 
To eliminate this contention, the police defined their responsibility 
as maintaining law and order and combating low levels of insur- 
gent activity, while the army was to locate and destroy guerrilla 
bases and fight in major encounters. 

After 1975, however, the military leadership grew increasingly 
concerned over incursions by Vietnamese forces from Cambodia 
and by Laotian forces along the lengthy northern and northeastern 
border. With the defeat of most of the insurgency, the army con- 
centrated on establishing defensive positions and developing the 
forces needed to counter the Vietnamese and Laotian threats. 

The navy's basic mission continued to be protecting the sea 
approaches to the country and assisting the internal security forces 
in suppressing insurgent activity. The navy was also responsible 
for conducting river patrols and antipiracy efforts in the Gulf of 
Thailand. The air force was charged with providing tactical air 
support to ground and naval forces. It also had a limited capabil- 
ity for aerial strikes against invading ground forces and air-to-air 
combat. Its counterinsurgency aircraft and trained air crews were 
deployed on numerous occasions to assist the army and the BPP 
against guerrilla bands. 

In addition to their basic military roles, the armed forces partici- 
pated in a variety of civic action programs designed to support the 
country's development efforts. Public service by the armed forces 
included such major projects as road building and repair in remote 
regions, disaster relief, construction of dams and reservoirs, as- 
sistance in building irrigation works, and participation in agricul- 
tural reform efforts among the hill tribes. Aimed at preventing 
villagers and peasant farmers in the border regions from falling 
under the influence of insurgents, military civic action appeared 
highly successful. 

Manpower: Sources and Quality 

Thai law required that all male citizens serve in the military. 
The 1978 Constitution, in a section entitled "Duties of the Thai 
People," states, "every person shall have a duty to defend the 



244 



National Security 



country [and] . . . to serve in the armed forces as provided by law." 
Similar requirements appear in the 1978 document's numerous 
predecessors. The Military Service Act, administered by the army, 
implemented these requirements. The act — a national conscrip- 
tion law — required two years of active military duty. 

All Thai males were required to register when they became eigh- 
teen years of age but were not liable for compulsory service until 
they reached twenty-one. At that time they were notified to report 
for a physical examination, on the basis of which they were assigned 
to one of four categories: those who were fully qualified to serve 
in combat units; those who were partially disabled and only eligi- 
ble for duty in support units; those with minor physical disqualifi- 
cations that could be corrected before the next call-up; and those 
who were physically disqualified and exempt. 

In addition to those exempted for physical reasons, Buddhist 
monks, career teachers, cadets attending the military academies, 
students in certain technical courses, naturalized citizens, and per- 
sons convicted of a crime subject to a penalty of ten years' imprison- 
ment were not drafted. Waivers were granted in cases of personal 
hardship, for example, when an individual was the sole support 
of parents or minor children. Students in the later stages of their 
education also found it easy to obtain deferment. The exemption 
granted to naturalized citizens was designed to exclude the coun- 
try's Chinese from the armed forces, but selective application of 
the law to other ethnic minorities as well resulted in a military estab- 
lishment composed largely of members of the Thai Buddhist 
majority. 

Thailand has always had an ample source of manpower for its 
military needs. In 1987 population estimates indicated that the coun- 
try had nearly 13.6 million males aged 15 to 49, of whom an esti- 
mated 8.4 million were considered physically fit for military service. 
Roughly 520,000 young men reached the age of 18 each year, but 
the total annual induction averaged only about 30,000 men. Be- 
cause the supply exceeded the demand, only those in the best phys- 
ical condition were selected for service. Many inductees came from 
rural areas and were reliable, hardy, physically fit, adaptable, and 
accustomed to working outdoors in tropical heat, humid climate, 
and monsoon rains; many possessed a keen interest in learning and 
developing new skills. The average conscript accepted his military 
obligation as a necessary duty. 

Inductees were usually sent to the nearest army, navy, or air 
force installation where the need was greatest. There the conscripts 
were assigned to units for training and then to appropriate service 
elements for duty. After a two-year commitment, conscripts who 



245 



Thailand: A Country Study 

did not choose to reenlist (or were not permitted to do so) were 
released and placed on unassigned reserve status for an additional 
twenty-three years. During this period of reserve service they were 
subject to recall whenever a need arose. The priority of recall was 
based on age, the youngest reserves being reinducted first. In 
mid- 1987 observers estimated that the system had produced more 
than 500,000 reserves whose military training and physical fitness 
made them reasonably available for emergency use in the army. 

Noncommissioned officers (NCOs) were, in most cases, former 
conscripts who had reenlisted to make a career of the military ser- 
vice. On the basis of past performance, they were selected to attend 
an NCO school and upon graduation returned to their units in their 
new status. A limited number of NCOs were procured by placing 
on active duty graduates of reserve training programs conducted 
by the Ministry of Defense. 

The officer corps of the armed forces was composed mainly of 
graduates of the service academies and officer candidate schools. 
It also included a small number of reserve officers who had com- 
pleted training courses while in college and subsequently assumed 
military careers. A few officers with special qualifications were com- 
missioned directly from civilian life. In the past the practice of 
appointing civilians to military positions was fairly widespread and 
had important political effects. Under the Civil Service Act of 1928 
(amended in 1954), a number of high-ranking officials once promi- 
nent in the political bureaucracy became generals and acceded to 
prominent positions within the military hierarchy without under- 
going military training or rising through the ranks. Although most 
of these senior officers worked as administrators on headquarters 
staffs, they had political clout and were important members of the 
contending military cliques that figured prominently in the coups 
and countercoups after 1932. Thailand's laws governing manda- 
tory military retirement eventually eliminated these old guard gener- 
als and admirals, but the established pattern of rival cliques within 
the armed forces — particularly the army — persisted in the late 
1980s. 

Within the army, in particular, military academy classmate 
groupings were important. Officers identified with their classmates, 
and detailed records were kept of each academy class. Most Thai 
officers knew with which class any other officer had graduated. In 
the mid-1980s, officers from Class Five, led by Lieutenant Gen- 
eral Suchinda Kraprayoon, the army deputy chief of staff, com- 
manded seven of the army's thirteen divisions and formed a crucial 
base of political support for Prime Minister Prem. 



246 



Royal Thai Army 
commander in chief, 
General 

Chaovalit Yongchaiyut 
Courtesy 
Voice of America 




1 



v 



Little information was publicly available on promotion criteria 
and the rate of upward mobility within the officer corps. It was 
known, however, that the pay — even for senior officers — was low 
by Western standards. This fact of military life encouraged officers 
of every rank to engage in outside commercial activities — a prac- 
tice that not only supplemented their service income but also 
enhanced their influence within the society. Many in important 
military positions served simultaneously on corporate directorates, 
family real estate companies, and other business ventures. For the 
most part, the Thai citizenry had come to accept their leaders' 
threefold roles as soldiers, businessmen, and politicians. 

Following the coups of the 1950s and 1960s, officers in the los- 
ing factions were either purged or relegated to positions of little 
importance or potential threat. Falls from grace, however, were 
less permanent or violent in the Thai system than in some other 
countries. At the same time, officers who backed the winning group 
were usually promoted and given assignments supporting the new 
leaders. Other officers played important roles in expanding the 
power of governing regimes by transferring from the army to the 
police and from the military to the bureaucracy. 

After the coup of October 1977, which brought Kriangsak, the 
supreme commander of the armed forces, into national power as 
prime minister, much publicity was given to the role played by 
a faction within the officer corps commonly referred to as the Young 



247 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Turks. Composed largely of Class Seven academy graduates, many 
of whom were key battalion commanders, the group was depicted 
as symbolic of the growing disparity between the conservative old 
guard of the politico-military establishment and the foreign-trained 
younger officers who were seeking to modernize society. The 
reformist Young Turks were critical of the extravagant life- style 
of the military leadership, especially when contrasted with the liv- 
ing conditions of ordinary soldiers fighting the insurgents. The 
young reformist officers aided Kriangsak's takeover and helped nul- 
lify the power of the old guard officers' faction. 

However, the coup attempt of April 1981 , in which many Young 
Turk officers had major roles, tarnished the reputation of the group, 
and those involved were expelled from military service. When a 
few Young Turks led a second unsuccessful coup attempt in Sep- 
tember 1985, their credibility declined further. Nonetheless, in a 
spirit of reconciliation typical of the Thai system, most Young Turk 
officers were permitted by the army chief of staff, General Chaovalit 
Yongchaiyut, to return to active duty in 1986. Although they were 
assigned to less important staff positions, the move to heal rifts and 
establish unity enhanced the political credentials of General 
Chaovalit. 

By the late 1980s, the Thai army had a large group of well- 
trained, forward-looking officers, many of whom occupied influen- 
tial command and staff posts. This group of younger officers was 
described as increasingly outraged at the inefficient, expensive Thai- 
style democracy. Their growing influence was reflected in the in- 
creased attention given to their views by the government. 

Defense Spending 

Beginning in the 1950s, when the country undertook to build 
up and modernize its armed forces to withstand perceived threats 
from communist expansion in Southeast Asia, there was a rela- 
tively steady increase in government expenditures for defense. Dur- 
ing that time, social and economic developments had to compete 
with an expanding military establishment for limited financial 
resources. The high cost of maintaining a credible defense posture 
was compounded by a desire to stay abreast of weaponry advances 
in a rapidly changing technological age as well as by rising infla- 
tion rates and economic retrenchment. 

During the three decades of Thai military modernization, the 
amounts of money budgeted and expended for defense varied some- 
what according to whether or not a military regime controlled the 
government. Predictably, defense expenditures tended to rise 
moderately when military governments were in power, but even 



248 



National Security 



then the percentages of total government outlays for the armed 
forces were not inordinate when compared with defense expendi- 
tures in some other countries, nor were they high when compared 
with amounts spent on social needs, such as education and health. 

In the mid-1980s, defense spending averaged about 30 percent 
of the government's annual current expenditures and about 4.2 
percent of the gross national product (GNP). Additional costs of 
internal security, which were attributed in government statistics 
to the Ministry of Interior rather than to the Ministry of Defense, 
further increased the country's total current security burden by 
an average of about 6 percent annually. But even with internal 
security costs added, government statistics still did not reflect the 
total defense bill. Reports of funds budgeted and expended reflected 
only amounts covering current accounts and did not include the 
cost of new equipment acquired to update the armed forces' fight- 
ing capabilities. 

Although the country's armed forces did not constitute a large 
military establishment when compared with those of some other 
Asian nations, the costs of maintaining combat readiness began, 
by the late 1980s, to pose problems for the government treasury. 
The country was experiencing many of the economic problems com- 
mon to developing countries undergoing rapid economic change. 
Among these were a worrisome trade deficit inherited from previ- 
ous regimes and the continuing impact of rising oil prices (see 
International Trade and Finance, ch. 3). At the same time, 
moreover, the government was still coping with a persistent possi- 
bility of insurgency and with the threat from Vietnam. 

During the era of American involvement in the war in Vietnam, 
the United States met most of Thailand's military equipment needs 
with a steady flow of hardware, mainly in the form of grant aid 
(see Foreign Security Assistance, this ch.). In the mid-1970s, the 
United States Congress dramatically reduced the role of grant mili- 
tary assistance, relying instead on foreign military sales and direct 
commercial sales. To make up for the loss of United States grants 
and to cover the costs of equipment needed in the country's efforts 
to modernize its armed forces, the government in 1976 authorized 
its Ministry of Finance to obtain US$1 billion in loans from pri- 
vate banks in the United States and Western Europe over the next 
6 to 8 years. Approximately one-half of this amount was devoted 
to hardware requirements of the army; air force and navy needs 
were to be met by equal portions of the remaining one-half. This 
approximate distribution of funds was the pattern for defense 
expenditures followed by succeeding governments. 



249 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Although it was not a common practice for private banks to lend 
money to foreign governments for military purposes, banks in the 
United States, Britain, Canada, and the Federal Republic of Ger- 
many (West Germany) had loaned Thailand more than US$335 
million by the late 1980s. Thailand's unconventional approach to 
its defense needs was aided by its generally high credit rating among 
the world's private banks and the judgment of most bankers that 
the money would be used for the country's own defense rather than 
for purposes of aggression. 

Domestic Defense Industry 

Before the 1970s, domestic defense production was extremely 
limited. Local industrial plants made items such as uniforms, 
storage batteries, glassware, preserved foods, some electronic 
devices, and certain pharmaceutical and chemical products. The 
production of armaments, began on a modest scale in 1969 and 
received increasing government assistance. In August 1976, the 
Ministry of Defense announced that it had invested more than 
US$200 million since 1969 in developing domestic production of 
ordnance items. This investment resulted in the local production 
of 5.56mm, 7.62mm, and .30 calibre ammunition. In addition, 
the government operated facilities for limited rebuilding and 
modernization of military vehicles, aircraft engines, and helicop- 
ters. A modern dockyard provided similar improvements as well 
as maintenance on naval vessels and their armaments. Most of these 
capabilities were achieved with American technical assistance. 

In December 1977, Prime Minister Kriangsak announced plans 
to establish a number of new factories to increase the strength of 
the country's arms industry. In particular, he hoped to meet in- 
ternal security requirements for ammunition and light weapons. 
The industrial expansion called for private as well as government- 
owned facilities. The primary vehicle for this was a privately owned 
company called Thai Interarms, which received substantial govern- 
ment aid. Divided into four subunits, the company manufactured 
small arms, ammunition, gunpowder, and other explosives. In ad- 
dition, a factory established in Ta Khli, a joint venture between 
the Thai government and the Winchester Company of the United 
States, had a projected production capability of 1 million tons of 
ammunition annually, including rockets. 

To strengthen the navy's combat readiness, the government 
expanded its naval repair facilities with aid from the United States, 
Italy, and Japan. As a result, Thailand produced a variety of naval 
vessels, including six fast coastal patrol boats, and had an LST 
(landing ship, tank) under construction in 1987. Despite the 



250 



Former Prime Minister Kriangsak Chomanand 
Courtesy Royal Thai Embassy 

ambitious scope of plans for a domestic defense industry, however, 
production failed to reach the levels desired. 

Foreign Security Assistance 

Although other Western nations — notably Britain, West Ger- 
many, and Italy — have provided Thailand with moderate amounts 
of military aid, the chief source of armament and training assistance 
since 1950 has been the United States. From 1950 through early 
1976, the substantial majority of United States aid was in the form 
of grants under the Military Assistance Program (MAP). Addi- 
tional aid was offered in the form of Foreign Military Sales (FMS) 
credits, part of which carried United States guarantees of payment 
to American commercial suppliers if necessary. 

The goal of United States assistance was to strengthen Thailand's 
military capability through buildup and modernization of its equip- 
ment, improvement of its operational tactics, and increased train- 
ing for its personnel. As the communist-supported insurgency 
became a potential threat to the kingdom's political stability in the 
1960s, increased military aid was channeled to support the Thai 
internal security forces in their counterinsurgency actions. To assist 
the Thai in meeting requirements for military aid and to super- 
vise the United States program in the field, increasing numbers 



251 



Thailand: A Country Study 

of American military specialists were assigned to the Joint United 
States Military Assistance Group (JUSMAG) in Bangkok. 

During the Second Indochina War (1954-75), the United States 
and Thailand negotiated an unsigned agreement to permit Ameri- 
can naval and air units to use Thai territory. Although units of 
the United States Navy operated from modern facilities established 
at Sattahip on the Gulf of Thailand, the vast majority of American- 
occupied bases in the country were used by combat squadrons and 
supporting units of the United States Air Force. In addition to a 
number of intelligence outposts scattered about the North and 
Northeast, there were seven air bases from which United States 
aircraft flew combat missions against targets throughout Indochina. 

These bases were at Udon Thani, Nakhon Phanom, Nam Phong, 
Nakhon Ratchasima, Ubon Ratchathani, Ta Khli, and Ban U 
Taphao. Constructed at a cost to the United States of several 
hundred million dollars, most of the facilities were former Thai 
installations that were modernized to accommodate the American 
squadrons. After completion of the renovation and expansion work 
by Thai civilian contractors, the bases had permanent buildings, 
sophisticated ground support equipment, and runways capable of 
accommodating modern combat aircraft. During the height of the 
war the bases were used by more than 500 American airplanes, 
including several squadrons of B-52 heavy bombers of the Stra- 
tegic Air Command. At some of the bases, facilities were shared 
with training units of the Royal Thai Air Force. 

Thai reaction to the United States military presence was mixed. 
Senior Thai officers tended to believe that the presence of the United 
States combat squadrons provided assurance against potentially 
aggressive designs of communist countries in the region. Some in 
the government, however, were concerned that the installations 
would invite hostile political or military action against Thailand. 
The presence of roughly 45,000 United States servicemen also had 
a pronounced socioeconomic effect — one that was increased by the 
large number of American personnel who came to Bangkok on rest 
and recreation leaves from the Vietnam combat zone. 

A phased withdrawal of the American presence began in 1969, 
when United States participation in the war in Indochina decreased, 
and it proceeded through the early 1970s as internal political ten- 
sions rose in the Thai kingdom (see Thailand in Transition, ch. 
1). By late July 1976, at the request of the Thai government, the 
last of the United States air and naval units had departed. The 
facilities at Sattahip and the seven air bases were turned over to 
the Thai government, with much of the sophisticated ground sup- 
port equipment removed. Considerable controversy ensued between 



252 



National Security 



Thai military and government officials over the future of the aban- 
doned network of airfields. Ultimately the military retained control 
over the bases, even though most were in excess of their needs and 
of the government's ability to pay for upkeep. Nakhon Ratchasima 
alone had cost the United States approximately US$2.5 million a 
year to maintain. Consolidating the equipment left by departing 
United States units in accordance with government-to-government 
agreements, the Thai air force assumed use of some of the instal- 
lations. 

After 1976 MAP aid to Thailand declined, and FMS credits in- 
creased. By 1979 Thailand had been dropped from the United States 
shrinking list of grant aid recipients. But later that year, after Viet- 
nam invaded Cambodia, President Jimmy Carter expedited deliv- 
ery of approximately US$400 million in arms and military supplies 
that the Thai government had under contract from American com- 
panies. This action set a precedent for expedited equipment deliv- 
eries on a periodic basis to demonstrate American support for 
Thailand in the face of the Vietnamese threat in Cambodia. In 
the mid-1980s, as the country was increasingly caught between eco- 
nomic retrenchment and the need to upgrade its defense capabili- 
ties, the United States Congress approved resumption of a limited 
military grant aid program for Thailand. 

Beginning in the early 1980s, the country hosted a series of joint 
Thai-United States military exercises. A major annual combined 
exercise called Cobra Gold, as well as many smaller exercises, served 
to enhance relations between the two countries' armed forces. All 
four United States services sent troops to take part in the exercises, 
which were designed as training vehicles for both countries. 

In 1986 the United States and Thailand agreed to establish a 
war reserve weapons pool in Thailand. This concept was first raised 
by a former Thai supreme commander of the armed forces, General 
Saiyud Kerdphon in 1982, and the proposal received bilateral sup- 
port during a meeting between Prime Minister Prem and Secre- 
tary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger in April 1986. As the plan 
was formulated, these war reserve stocks were designed to improve 
Thailand's ability to withstand aggression and were to be used only 
in the event of a "nation-threatening emergency." 

According to United States government statistics, between 1950 
and 1987 the United States provided Thailand with more than US$2 
billion in military assistance. Approximately US$1.2 billion was 
in the form of grant aid and covered arms purchases, training of 
military personnel, and transfer of excess items from the United 
States military equipment inventory. The remainder — almost US$1 
billion — was made available in the form of FMS credits to be applied 



253 



Thailand: A Country Study 

against commercial sales of military items from American manufac- 
turers. The FMS credit program was expected to continue into the 
1990s. 

Military Structure 

Largely because of the advice and military aid received from the 
United States in the decades since World War II, Thailand's mili- 
tary establishment reflected to some degree the influence of Ameri- 
can defense practices. This was particularly apparent in the 
organizational structure of its high command (see fig. 15). 

Although the 1978 Constitution — like its predecessors — declares 
that the king is the head of the armed forces, his role is chiefly 
ceremonial. Until 1957 functional control was generally exercised 
by the prime minister through the minister of defense. Both posi- 
tions were important in the national power structure, but they were 
usually held by political appointees who had little actual authority 
over the troops. 

As the military establishment grew in size and proficiency, con- 
trol over its operations became vested in the supreme commander 
of the armed forces. Over the years the influence inherent in the 
job marked it as a logical springboard to the prime minister's office. 
Even in periods dominated by military regimes, the various heads 
of government watched the activities of the supreme commander 
warily, realizing that their own positions of authority were subject 
in large measure to his concurrence. This pattern is exemplified 
by the military coup d'etat of September 1957 in which Sarit 
Thanarat took over the government. Assuming control of the mili- 
tary establishment as prime minister, Sarit further ensured his posi- 
tion of authority in April 1960 by securing a royal decree that 
designated him supreme commander as well. This title was simi- 
larly assumed by Field Marshal Thanom Kittikachorn, who suc- 
ceeded Sarit as prime minister in 1963. 

Despite past successes in using this seemingly traditional basis 
of influence, the supreme commander with political ambitions was 
still subject to the military retirement system. According to the Mili- 
tary Service Act of 1954, retirement at age sixty was mandatory 
for all military personnel. A year after General Kriangsak became 
prime minister in 1977 he had to relinquish his additional position 
as supreme commander of the armed forces because of the mili- 
tary retirement age. 

Throughout the history of military governments in Thailand, 
the effective authority wielded by the prime minister depended, 
in large measure, on support from the real center of military 
power — the army commander in chief, who controlled the field 



254 



National Security 



forces — and on the adroitness of the prime minister in garnering 
such support for himself. Prime Minister Kriangsak was success- 
ful in this regard in 1978 when he appointed the commander of 
the Second Army, General Prem Tinsulanonda — a respected profes- 
sional soldier — commander in chief of the army. In June 1979 Prem 
was given the additional position of minister of defense within the 
Council of Ministers. Prem went on from these posts to succeed 
Kriangsak as prime minister in 1980. General Arthit Kamlangek 
served as both army commander in chief and supreme commander 
of the armed forces until 1986, when he lost the former title as a 
result of his outspoken opposition to Prime Minister Prem. Arthit 
retired from active duty in 1986. 

On national security matters that required coordinated cabinet 
action or presented a serious threat to the country's sovereignty, 
the prime minister was advised by the National Security Council. 
This body consisted of the prime minister as chairman; his deputies; 
the council's secretary general; the ministers of defense, foreign 
affairs, interior, communications, and finance; and the supreme 
commander of the armed forces. Traditionally the prime minister 
dominated the workings of the council. 

The Ministry of Defense supervised the operations and adminis- 
tration of the military establishment and coordinated military poli- 
cies with those of other governmental agencies concerned with 
national security. The defense minister received advice on mili- 
tary matters — particularly those pertaining to draft laws, budget 
allocations, mobilization, training, and deployment of the armed 
forces in response to national need — from the ministry's Defense 
Council. This body comprised the minister of defense as chairman; 
his two deputy ministers; the undersecretary of defense; the supreme 
commander of the armed forces; the chief of staff of the Supreme 
Command; the commanders in chief of the three services, their 
deputies, and chiefs of staff; and not more than three additional 
general officers selected for their outstanding ability. 

Each of the three armed services was headed by a commander 
in chief who was directly responsible to the supreme commander 
of the armed forces for the combat readiness and operation of his 
units (see fig. 16). Although the three components were equal under 
the law, the army was in fact the dominant service. Key positions 
in both the armed forces high command structure and the cabi- 
nets of military regimes traditionally were held by senior army 
officers. In order to ensure support from the other services, however, 
senior officers from the navy, air force, and police occasionally were 
appointed to a few key ministries. In general the structural form 
of service units and the method of their employment were similar 



255 



Thailand: A Country Study 



COUNCIL OF 
MINISTERS 
(CABINET) 



OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY 
TO THE MINISTER 



OFFICE OF THE 
UNDERSECRETARY 



SECRETARIAT 
DEPARTMENT 



JUDGE ADVOCATE 
GENERAL'S 
DEPARTMENT 



DEFENSE 
ENERGY 
DEPARTMENT 



ROYAL 
AIDES-DE-CAMP 
DEPARTMENT 



FINANCE 
DEPARTMENT 



ARMED FORCES 
INDUSTRIAL 
DEPARTMENT 



i ORGANIZATION I 
: SUPPLYING ; 
• FUEL TO THE ! 
ARMED FORCES : 



FACTORIES 
! SUPPLYING \ 
THE 

i ARMED FORCES ;i 



ADVISORY 

SUPERVISORY 

COMMAND 



PRIME MINISTER 



MINISTER OF 
DEFENSE 



NATIONAL 
SECURITY 
COUNCIL 



DEFENSE COUNCIL 



SUPREME COMMANDER 
OF THE ARMED FORCES 



SUPREME COMMAND 
HEADQUARTERS 



OFFICE 
OF THE 
SUPREME 
COMMAND 



ADJUTANT 
GENERAL'S 
DEPARTMENT 



DIRECTORATE 

OF JOINT 
PERSONNEL 

(J-1) 



DIRECTORATE 

OF JOINT 
INTELLIGENCE 

(J-2) 



DIRECTORATE 

OF JOINT 
OPERATIONS 
(J-3) 



DIRECTORATE 
OF JOINT 
LOGISTICS 
(J-4) 



DIRECTORATE ' 

OF JOINT 
COMMUNICA- 
TIONS 



DIRECTORATE 
OF EDUCATION 
AND 
RESEARCH 



NATIONAL 
DEFENSE 
COLLEGE 



ARMED FORCES 
STAFF 
COLLEGE 



ARMED FORCES 
SURVEY 
DEPARTMENT 



ARMED FORCES 
SECURITY 
CENTER 



COMPTROLLER 



MEDICAL 
M RESEARCH 
LAB 



1 ROYAL THAI 




ROYAL THAI 




ROYAL THAI 


J ARMY 




NAVY 




AIR FORCE 



Internal Security Operational Command; nominally under the prime minister 
but actually controlled by the commander in chief of the Royal Thai Army. 



Figure 15. High Command of the Royal Thai Armed Forces, 1987 



to those of comparable United States military components, although 
they differed in size and in the technological sophistication of their 
equipment. 

Royal Thai Army 

The oldest and largest of the military services, the Royal Thai 
Army traditionally served as the mainstay of the kingdom's defense 
system. The commander in chief and his large staff of military 
specialists, headquartered in Bangkok, directed the army in carrying 



256 



National Security 



out its mission. For tactical and administrative purposes, the army 
operated through four regional army commands. The First Army, 
headquartered in Bangkok, was responsible for the country's 
western and central provinces and the capital city (see fig. 17). The 
northeastern quadrant was the territorial home of the Second Army, 
and its regional headquarters were in Nakhon Ratchasima. The 
region of the Third Army, with headquarters in Phitsanulok, con- 
sisted of the northern and northwestern parts of the kingdom. The 
Fourth Army's region was southern Thailand; its headquarters were 
in Nakhon Si Thammarat. 

Tactically, the army was organized into seven infantry divisions 
(including five tank battalions), one armored division, one cavalry 
division (with an armor capability), eight independent infantry bat- 
talions, two special forces divisions trained and geared for small 
unit special and airborne operations, one field artillery division, 
and one air defense artillery division. Three airmobile companies 
provided the ground force units with battlefield support. 

Although the army's primary mission was to defend the coun- 
try against aggression by foreign ground forces, for many years 
invasion was considered an unlikely possibility by Thai civilian and 
military leaders, in part because of the defense umbrella provided 
by the United States. Moreover, many Thai leaders believed that 
such a threat probably could be circumvented politically without 
need for a military response. Furthermore, some assurance was 
derived from the fact that Cambodia and Laos, which were not 
regarded as serious potential threats, were between Thailand and 
Vietnam, the region's most belligerent power. Consequently, from 
the 1960s through the mid-1970s field action by army units con- 
centrated mostly on dispelling insurgency. Devoting its training 
programs, equipment inventory, and operational capabilities to 
counterinsurgency, the army thus shelved its primary mission and 
for more than a decade concentrated on providing internal security. 

Because there was such a melange of security forces combating 
the insurgency, the army's units were dispersed throughout the 
country — often in a manner that negated their value as frontline 
defenders in the event of invasion. For many years the single armored 
division was committed to counterinsurgency action in the North 
and operated as infantry; most other tank battalions were on per- 
manent duty in Bangkok, partly for internal political reasons. These 
scattered units could not have regrouped rapidly and effectively 
enough to support an infantry struggling to repel invaders. Simi- 
larly, artillery units were dispersed in small detachments designed- 
to engage in limited action. The bulk of the infantry divisions were 
garrisoned in the interior at regional army command headquarters. 



257 



Thailand: A Country Study 



LL LU 
LJJ O 

cc < 
< h 



o o 

o cc 



Q Cl 

o cc 



CL 

CO O 

CO J— 

=> 
CO 



Cl 








o 




cc 




o 








< 












o 




o 







Q 


CAL 


IMAN 


CTI 


O 


< 


o 




cc 




< 






LL 








OS 




z < 




cc < 




















OMM 
ROY 




o 



LL 




LL 


LL 




LL 


< 




< 






1— 






CO 


_l 






< 




z 


o 






SPE 




TRAI 







CO 




ANDS 
ORCE 












o S 








< o 




LU O 








< 





258 



National Security 



Concentrating large numbers of troops in the interior rather than 
deploying them to border defense positions helped reduce finan- 
cial costs because government regulations required that combat 
troops in field operations receive per diem payments of the equiva- 
lent of about US$1.00 in addition to regular salaries. (The police 
and civil servants also received this compensation when they were 
on government field operations or travel status.) The shortage of 
per diem money plagued defense and internal security operations, 
even during the years of United States military aid. 

The army's top-heavy organizational structure and its role in 
political affairs also diluted its effectiveness as a conventional combat 
force. Because the country could not afford to maintain a large 
trained military, the army was organized to depend for the majority 
of its troops below the NCO ranks on conscripts serving their two- 
year service obligations. Most of these conscripts did not reenlist 
after their required commitments, and therefore a large percent- 
age of their active service was spent in training. There were able 
officers at all levels of command, but the staffs at higher head- 
quarters were inflated with high-ranking officers using their posi- 
tions as opportunities for promotion and political advancement, 
particularly if they were assigned in Bangkok. 

Key units of the First Army, stationed permanently in the capi- 
tal, frequently provided the military backup for the coup d'etat 
attempts of senior army officers. At other times they were used 
by military leaders in power to forestall the coup aspirations of rival 
factions. The First Army also furnished detachments that served 
as the king's bodyguard and other units that took part in ceremonial 
activities in Bangkok. 

Vietnam's invasion of Cambodia in December 1978 eliminated 
this complacent approach to national defense. Thailand scrambled 
to redeploy its combat forces and to provide its frontline units with 
the equipment and munitions needed to combat the Vietnamese 
threat along the Cambodian border. The Thai army's lack of read- 
iness to provide border defense soon became apparent. Prime 
Minister Kriangsak flew to Washington in February 1979 to seek 
assistance in updating the army's military equipment inventory, 
which was ill-suited to modern defensive operations, particularly 
against the better equipped and more experienced Vietnamese. 
Despite the sympathetic response of the United States, the task of 
revamping the Royal Thai Army to meet potential threat was for- 
midable, as the service's weapons inventory revealed. 

To upgrade its state of combat readiness the army sought to 
increase its holdings of tanks and armored personnel carriers, 
improve its antitank capabilities, add heavier and longer range guns 



259 



Thailand: A Country Study 




Figure 17. Major Thai Military Installations, 1987 



260 



National Security 



and howitzers to its artillery inventory, and enhance its ability to 
provide adequate battlefield defense against attacking enemy air- 
craft. These modernization efforts were hampered by economic 
retrenchment throughout the 1980s (see table 17, Appendix). 

Other changes contemplated for the early 1990s included plans 
to upgrade the four infantry divisions stationed along the Cambo- 
dian border to mechanized or light infantry configurations. New 
training guidelines were designed to pare training time and estab- 
lish a pool of trained reservists to draw upon as needed. General 
Chaovalit Yongchaiyut, in 1987 army commander in chief, called 
for reducing the number of ''idle" generals by decreasing the num- 
ber of general officers on active duty from more than 200 to about 
80. Army troop strength was held at about 190,000 by lowering 
the conscription rate as the force moved toward becoming a totally 
volunteer army. Thai military planners proposed to upgrade the 
training and size of the army reserve force, studying systems used 
in Singapore and Israel. 

Royal Thai Navy 

Although Thailand had small naval components throughout 
much of its long history, the development of a modern navy capa- 
ble of carrying out combat missions dated from the post-World War 
II period. Thereafter, the size and efficiency of the Royal Thai Navy 
increased steadily. Of the three service branches, the navy was the 
least involved in national politics and therefore was able to con- 
centrate more of its time and efforts on its security mission. 

Naval affairs were directed by the country's most senior admiral 
from his Bangkok headquarters. The naval commander in chief 
was supported by staff groups that planned and administered such 
activities as logistics, education and training, and various special 
services. The headquarters general staff functioned like those of 
corresponding staffs in the army and air force command structures. 

The navy's combat forces included the Royal Fleet and the Royal 
Thai Marine Corps. The latter was organized into two regiments 
composed of one artillery battalion, six infantry battalions, and one 
amphibious assault battalion; a light tank battalion was also pro- 
posed. The 130 vessels of the Royal Fleet included frigates equipped 
with surface-to-air missiles, fast attack craft armed with surface- 
to-surface missiles, large coastal patrol craft, coastal minelayers, 
coastal minesweepers, landing craft, and training ships (see table 
18, Appendix). In addition, a small naval air component flew a 
modest inventory of helicopters and light aircraft in reconnaissance, 
patrol, antisubmarine warfare, and search-and-rescue missions. 
Major operational bases for the fleet, the marines, and the air units 



261 



Thailand: A Country Study 

were the naval stations in Bangkok and Songkhla and the major 
naval bases at Sattahip and Ban Pak Nam. 

In 1977 the government began construction of a new naval base 
in Ban Thap Mo District of Phangnga Province facing the Anda- 
man Sea and approaches to the southern region. The new Phangnga 
naval base, completed by 1983, had a large steel-reinforced con- 
crete wharf, dockyard, arsenal, living quarters for naval person- 
nel, and other military facilities. The new base gave the Thai navy 
a modest but much-needed operations and support facility on the 
west coast of the Isthmus of Kra. 

Royal Thai Air Force 

The Royal Thai Air Force was the most recently formed of the 
three services. The air force had a command structure consisting 
of five groups: headquarters, logistics support, education, special 
services, and combat forces. The headquarters group in Bangkok 
performed the usual general staff functions, including planning and 
directing operations of the combat elements. The logistics support 
group provided engineering, communications, ordnance, transpor- 
tation, quartermaster, and medical services support. The educa- 
tion group coordinated and supervised all air force training 
programs. The special service group was responsible for the wel- 
fare of air force personnel and coordinated the activities of Thai 
civil aviation with those of the air force. 

The operational units of the air force were organized into two 
functional elements: a tactical air command structured and 
equipped for conventional warfare and an aerial security force 
trained and geared for counterinsurgency and other internal secu- 
rity missions. In 1987 the tactical air command had a combat force 
of one squadron committed to forward ground attack, two squad- 
rons of fighter-interceptors also used for armed reconnaissance, a 
separate reconnaissance squadron that also served in a training role, 
three transport squadrons, one utility squadron, two helicopter 
squadrons, and one training squadron. The security force consisted 
of seven counterinsurgency squadrons, equipped with helicopter 
gunships, and other light aircraft suitable for counterinsurgency 
operations. Airfield security was provided by four battalions of 
troops trained in perimeter defense tactics. 

The air force maintained a number of modern bases from which 
it conducted its administrative, transport, and training operations. 
The bases, which were constructed between 1954 and 1968, had 
permanent buildings, sophisticated ground support equipment, and 
some of the best runways in Asia. All but one were part of the net- 
work of airfields built and used by United States forces until their 



262 



National Security 



withdrawal from Thailand in 1976. Consolidating the equipment 
left by the departing units in accordance with government-to- 
government agreements, the Thai air force assumed use of the in- 
stallations at Ta Khli and Nakhon Ratchasima. In the late 1980s, 
these bases and Don Muang Air Base outside Bangkok, which the 
air force shared with civil aviation, remained the primary opera- 
tional holdings. Maintenance of the facilities at other bases aban- 
doned by the United States proved too costly and exceeded Thai 
needs. Nonetheless, all runways were still available for training and 
emergency use. 

The American withdrawal had quickly revealed to the Thai 
Supreme Command the inadequacy of its air force in the event 
of a conventional war in Southeast Asia. Accordingly, in the 1980s 
the government allotted large amounts of money for the purchase 
of modern aircraft and spare parts. Thirty-eight F-5E and F-5F 
fighter-bombers purchased from the Northrop Corporation formed 
the nucleus of the air force's defense and tactical firepower. The 
F5Es were accompanied by training teams of American civilian 
and military technicians, who worked with members of the Thai 
air force. In addition to the F-5E and F-5F fighter-bombers, 
OV-10C aircraft, transports, and helicopters were added to the 
air force equipment inventory (see table 19, Appendix). In 1985 
the United States Congress authorized the sale of the F-16 fighter 
to Thailand. A total of twelve of these aircraft were scheduled for 
delivery in 1988. 

Training 

With increased funding for instructional purposes and with 
guidance from JUSMAG personnel stationed in the country, the 
Thai armed forces continued to improve their ability to handle 
sophisticated weapons and to employ the tactics of modern warfare. 
Over the years, Thailand expanded its training facilities, sent a 
large number of Thai officers to the United States for military in- 
struction, and augmented conventional training with counter- 
insurgency instruction. 

New army conscripts customarily underwent a sixteen-week pro- 
gram of instruction, half devoted to basic training and half to more 
specialized requirements. This initial program was followed by a 
three-phase unit training cycle that lasted the rest of the first year. 
Roughly two months were allotted to instruction and testing in 
squad and platoon tactics. Next came a second phase consisting 
of exercises at company and battalion levels. The third phase usually 
included some form of battalion maneuver. 



263 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Naval basic training lasted from eight to eleven weeks, depend- 
ing on the ultimate assignment of the conscript. The course cov- 
ered the elementary aspects of seamanship, navigation, ordnance, 
gunnery, and damage-control procedures. Marine recruits received 
the same basic training, but those selected for advanced training 
received additional instruction in counterinsurgency amphibious 
warfare. Unit training was generally conducted at the naval squad- 
ron level. Shipboard drills, including team gunnery and other 
underway operations, took place throughout the entire instruction 
cycle. 

The training program of the Royal Thai Air Force was patterned 
on that of its American counterpart. Upon completion of basic train- 
ing, recruits and conscripts were selected for more advanced pro- 
grams. Flight training for pilots and other aircrew members was 
conducted at Khorat Air Base (near Nakhon Ratchasima). Most 
air technical instruction took place at the school complex assigned 
to Don Muang Air Base near Bangkok. More advanced training 
was provided by the specialized schools of each branch of the armed 
forces and the entire system of military education coordinated by 
the Directorate of Education and Research at Supreme Command 
Headquarters. This directorate also supervised the operation of the 
combined and special service schools, such as the National Defense 
College and the Armed Forces Staff College. The National Defense 
College in Bangkok was the highest level military school in the coun- 
try. Its major objective was to foster cooperation between senior 
military and civilian authorities in planning and directing national 
security activities. Its course of instruction, conducted for a lim- 
ited number of high-ranking military, police, and civilian officials 
each year, covered military, political, and economic subjects. The 
Armed Forces Staff College in Bangkok, the second highest mili- 
tary school, was intended to produce senior general staff officers 
who were qualified to serve on joint or combined staffs. Annual 
enrollment was confined to a small number of officers selected from 
the three armed services. Attendance at either the Armed Forces 
Staff College or a service staff college was considered mandatory 
for advancement beyond the rank of major or lieutenant com- 
mander. 

In addition to its staff college, each of the armed forces oper- 
ated its own service academy. The army's Chulachomkhlao Royal 
Military Academy was the largest and oldest of these. In 1986 it 
was moved from its central Bangkok location to a new campus in 
Nakhon Nayok Province. The Royal Thai Naval College was at 
Ban Pak Nam and the Royal Thai Air Force Academy at Don 



264 



National Security 



Muang Air Base. The five-year academies served as the principal 
sources of junior officers for all three services. 

Each service also had intermediate military schools similar to 
those operated by the United States military establishment. In addi- 
tion, a sizable number of officers from all branches received train- 
ing in American institutions as well as in advanced technical training 
schools in the United States. The armed forces also maintained 
a variety of schools to provide technical training for NCOs. These 
were oriented primarily toward career enlisted men and offered 
courses that varied in length, depending on the particular voca- 
tional specialty involved. 

Uniforms, Ranks, and Insignia 

To build institutional solidarity and esprit de corps, each Thai 
service component developed its own distinctive uniforms, rank- 
ing system, and insignia. Many Thai military uniforms reflected 
historical foreign influences. For example, most of the distinctive 
service uniforms were patterned on those of the United States, but 
lower ranking enlisted navy personnel wore uniforms resembling 
those of their French counterparts. The early influence of British 
advisers to the Thai royal court and the historical role of the mili- 
tary in royal pomp and ceremony contributed to the splendor of 
formal dress uniforms worn by high-ranking officers and guards 
of honor for ceremonial occasions. 

The rank structures of the three armed services were similar to 
those of the respective branches of the United States Armed Forces, 
although the Thai system had fewer NCO and warrant officer desig- 
nations (see fig. 18; fig. 19). The king, as head of state and con- 
stitutional head of the armed forces, personally granted all 
commissions for members of the officer corps. Appointments to 
NCO ranks were authorized by the minister of defense. In theory, 
the authority and responsibilities of officers of various ranks cor- 
responded to those of their American counterparts. However, 
because of a perennial surplus of senior officers — in 1987 there were 
some 600 generals and admirals in a total force of about 
273,000 — Thai staff positions were often held by officers of higher 
rank than would have been the case in the United States or other 
Western military establishments. 

Thai military personnel were highly conscious of rank distinc- 
tions and of the duties, obligations, and benefits they entailed. Rela- 
tionships among officers of different grades and among officers, 
NCOs, and the enlisted ranks were governed by military tradition 
in a society where observance of differences in status was highly 
formalized. The social distance between officers and NCOs was 



265 



Thailand: A Country Study 




266 



National Security 




Thailand: A Country Study 

widened by the fact that officers usually were college or military 
academy graduates, while most NCOs had not gone beyond secon- 
dary school. There was often a wider gap between officers and con- 
scripts, most of whom had had even less formal education, service 
experience, or specialized training. 

Formal honors and symbols of merit occupied an important place 
in the Thai military tradition, and service personnel received and 
wore awards and decorations with pride. The government granted 
numerous awards, and outstanding acts of heroism, courage, and 
meritorious service received prompt recognition. 

Internal Security System 

The concept of public order founded on the supremacy of law 
has long been stressed in Thailand as a necessary prerequisite to 
internal security and the achievement of national development goals. 
For the most part, Thai governments, in accordance with constitu- 
tional provisions, have dealt with matters of public order through 
a comprehensive system of statutory law enforced by a professional 
police force. Some exceptions have occurred during periods of mar- 
tial law, which has been declared to control dissidence perceived 
as a threat to public safety. In such times, summary justice at the 
hands of the police and the army has stressed expediency in a way 
that has drawn criticism from human rights advocates throughout 
the world. 

One of these periods of martial law occurred after the bloody 
October 1976 coup d'etat, which brought to power the military 
junta known as the National Administrative Reform Council 
(NARC) and Thanin Kraivichien as prime minister (see Military 
Rule and Limited Parliamentary Government, 1976-83, ch. 4). 
The regime abolished the 1974 constitution and ruled by decree 
and martial law. During the following year the government issued 
a series of decrees known as NARC orders. These restrictive mea- 
sures were instituted following the brutal suppression of leftist stu- 
dent demonstrations at Thammasat University by police-supported 
and ultra-right vigilante gangs, such as the Red Gaurs (Red Bulls) 
and the Nawa Phon, or New Force (see Thailand in Transition, 
ch. 1). 

Most of the NARC orders applied to activities neither covered 
by the criminal code nor under the jurisdiction of the established 
system of criminal courts. The orders were enforced by arbitrary 
arrests of people suspected of communist leanings; long-term deten- 
tion or imprisonment, often without charge or trial; and summary 
execution of major offenders. Military courts had authority to try 
those defendants who were allowed a hearing, but the right of appeal 



268 



National Security 



was denied. The government also imposed press censorship, revok- 
ing the publication licenses of newspapers that criticized govern- 
ment activities. 

One of the most repressive of the decrees — NARC Order 22 — 
defined nine categories of offenses, six involving criminal viola- 
tions and three identifying political activities that "endanger soci- 
ety." The political offenses were defined as "instigating confusion," 
advocating political systems other than those headed by the king, 
and undertaking labor strikes. The decree stated that political 
detainees could be held for thirty days and could subsequently be 
required to attend democracy-training schools for periods as long 
as three months. These schools, operated under the government's 
reeducation program, provided lectures on democracy and Thai 
national institutions. Some NARC orders were retained by the 
Kriangsak regime immediately after it gained power in 1977 by 
ousting Thanin, but they were gradually phased out during con- 
ciliation efforts that led to adoption of the new Constitution in 
December 1978. 

In early February 1979, the National Assembly unanimously 
adopted the new Anti-Communist Activities Act, which had univer- 
sal application throughout the country. Later in the month mar- 
tial law was temporarily lifted as the government prepared for the 
national elections to be held in April. In August NARC Order 22 
was abolished, and the government revealed that nearly 12,000 peo- 
ple had been detained or imprisoned indefinitely under the decree's 
provisions since its imposition in October 1976. All who were still 
incarcerated solely on "danger to society" charges were granted 
amnesty and released. Although these actions drew favorable 
responses from some human rights critics, others saw continuing 
problems in the criminal justice system under the Anti-Communist 
Activities Act of 1979. 

The Anti-Communist Activities Act gave Thai security forces 
authority to search suspected individuals and establishments at any 
time without a court warrant and to detain suspects for a maxi- 
mum of 480 days. Moreover, the act gave provincial governors 
and regional military commanders broad powers to control the 
activities of local populations by imposing curfews, banning demon- 
strations and meetings, confiscating mail, monitoring telephone 
conversations, and reviewing business employers' personnel files. 
Human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International and 
the Union of Democratic Thai, regarded the new act as tantamount 
to a state of martial law. Most provisions of the Anti-Communist 
Activities Act were not enforced in the late 1980s because insur- 
gent activities had been virtually eliminated. Most of the other 



269 



Thailand: A Country Study 



aspects of arbitrary justice gave way to safeguards assured by the 
Constitution. Although laws mandating harsh sentences for cer- 
tain major crimes remained, they were infrequently implemented. 

Police and Paramilitary Forces 

Primary responsibility for the maintenance of public order 
through enforcement of the kingdom's laws was exercised by the 
Thailand National Police Department (TNPD), a subdivision of 
the Ministry of Interior. Charged with performing police functions 
throughout the entire country, the TNPD was a unitary agency 
whose power and influence in Thai national life had at times rivaled 
that of the army. 

The formal functions of the TNPD included more than the en- 
forcement of laws and apprehension of offenders. The department 
also played an important role in the government's efforts to sup- 
press the remnants of the insurgency. In the event of an invasion 
by external forces, much of the police force would come under the 
control of the Ministry of Defense to serve with, but not be incor- 
porated into, the military forces. 

Originally modeled on the pre-World War II national police force 
of Japan, the TNPD was reorganized several times to meet changing 
public order and internal security needs. American advice, train- 
ing, and equipment, which were provided from 1951 through the 
early 1970s, did much to introduce new law enforcement concepts 
and practices and to aid in the modernization of the TNPD. Dur- 
ing this era the strength and effectiveness of the police grew steadily. 

All components of the police system were administered by the 
TNPD headquarters in Bangkok, which also provided technical 
support for law enforcement activities throughout the kingdom (see 
fig. 20). The major operational units of the force were the Provin- 
cial Police, the Border Patrol Police (BPP), the Metropolitan Police, 
and smaller specialized units supervised by the Central Investiga- 
tion Bureau. 

In mid- 198 7 the total strength of the TNPD, including adminis- 
trative and support personnel, was estimated at roughly 110,000. 
Of this number, over one-half were assigned to the Provincial Police 
and some 40,000 to the BPP. More than 10,000 served in the 
Metropolitan Police. Quasi-military in character, the TNPD was 
headed by a director general, who held the rank of police general. 
He was assisted by three deputy directors general and five assis- 
tant directors general, all of whom held the rank of police lieutenant 
general. Throughout the TNPD system, all ranks except the lowest 
(constable) corresponded to those of the army. The proliferation 



270 



National Security 



of high ranks in the TNPD organizational structure, as in the 
military, indicated the political impact of the police on national life. 

Provincial Police 

The Provincial Police formed the largest of the TNPD opera- 
tional components in both manpower and geographic responsibil- 
ity. It was headed by a commander, who reported to the director 
general of the TNPD, and administered through four police 
regions — geographic areas of responsibility similar to those of the 
army regional commands. This force provided police services to 
every town and village throughout the kingdom except metropoli- 
tan Bangkok and border areas. The Provincial Police thus han- 
dled law enforcement activities and in many cases was the principal 
representative of the central government's authority in much of 
the country. 

During the 1960s and early 1970s, as the police assumed an in- 
creasing role in counterinsurgency operations, a lack of coordina- 
tion among security forces operating in the rural areas became 
apparent. Observers noted that the overall police effort suffered 
because of conflicting organizational patterns and the highly cen- 
tralized control system that required decisions on most matters to 
emanate from the various police bureaus of TNPD headquarters 
in Bangkok. 

A reorganization of the TNPD in 1978 and 1979 gave more com- 
mand authority to the four police lieutenant generals who served 
as regional commissioners of the Provincial Police. Thereafter, the 
senior officers of each region not only controlled all provincial police 
assigned to their respective geographic areas but also directed the 
railroad, highway, marine, and forestry police units operating there, 
without going through the chain of command to the Central Inves- 
tigation Bureau in Bangkok. Although this change increased the 
workload of the four regional headquarters, it resulted in greater 
efficiency and improved law enforcement. 

Border Patrol Police 

Developed in the 1950s with assistance from the United States 
Central Intelligence Agency, the paramilitary Border Patrol Police 
(BPP) has remained the country's most effective internal security 
force. Although technically part of the TNPD, the BPP has always 
enjoyed a great deal of basic autonomy within the national head- 
quarters as well as in its multifaceted field operations. Because the 
royal family was a principal patron of the organization, the BPP 
developed the esprit de corps of an elite unit. This traditional rela- 
tionship benefited both the palace and its paramilitary protectors. 



271 



Thailand: A Country Study 




272 



National Security 



At the same time, the BPP retained direct links with the larger Royal 
Thai Army — a relationship that afforded it an additional degree 
of political strength. Most BPP commanders were former army 
officers whose military ties were of considerable value in BPP oper- 
ations. 

Charged with border security along some 4,800 kilometers of 
land frontiers, the BPP's mission included collecting information 
on the activities of smugglers, bandits, illegal immigrants, refu- 
gees, infiltrators, and communist insurgents. To fulfill its mission, 
it employed an extensive intelligence network and maintained sur- 
veillance over villages and farming districts that had a history of 
cross-border activities. When armed force was required, the BPP 
was able to respond effectively. Despite its modest size in compar- 
ison with the army, the BPP became a primary counterinsurgency 
force because of its training, motivation, and unique skills. 

Thirty-two-man platoons functioning as security teams formed 
the basic operating units of the BPP. Each platoon was supported 
by one or more heavy weapons platoons stationed at the regional 
and area police headquarters. A special police aerial reinforcement 
unit airlifted BPP platoons to troubled areas when an emergency 
arose. Relatively well armed with modern light infantry equipment, 
the BPP also benefited from training by United States Army Spe- 
cial Forces advisers, who helped establish an instruction program 
during the 1960s. 

The BPP served as an important adjunct to the Thai military 
and often operated under army (and sometimes marine corps) con- 
trol during counterinsurgency operations. BPP units stationed along 
the Cambodian and Laotian borders following the Vietnamese 
invasion of Cambodia in 1979 often served as the first line of defense 
and bore the brunt of Vietnamese attacks. 

In order to carry out its primary intelligence mission, the BPP 
worked to establish rapport with remote area villagers and hill tribes. 
They engaged in civic action projects to gain the confidence and 
loyalty of rural peoples, building and operating more than 200 
schools in remote areas and helping the army to construct offices 
for civilian administration. In addition, they established rural med- 
ical aid stations, gave farmers agricultural assistance, and built small 
airstrips for communication and transportation purposes. 

Responding to village complaints of banditry and harassment 
by elements the central government considered subversive, the BPP 
supported the development of a local law enforcement adjunct 
known as the Volunteer Defense Corps (VDC). Established in 1954, 
the corps was intended to provide law and order, much like a civilian 
militia responsible to local authorities, in the event of defense 



273 



Thailand: A Country Study 

emergencies or natural disasters. The paramilitary VDC had the 
main responsibility for protecting local inhabitants from threats and 
intimidation by guerrillas who infiltrated the border provinces from 
neighboring Laos, Cambodia, and Malaysia. One of its chief tac- 
tics was to deny the insurgents access to the food and other sup- 
plies that made villages and farms favorite targets. VDC members 
received training from the BPP, and their effectiveness in both law 
enforcement and civic action was of considerable value to govern- 
ment goals. 

In the late 1980s, VDC strength was estimated at roughly 33,000, 
down from a peak of about 52,000 in 1980. Part of the reduction 
was absorbed by the formation of a new organization called the 
Thahan Phran. With a strength of about 14,000, the Thahan Phran 
was a volunteer irregular force deployed in active trouble spots along 
the Cambodian and Burmese borders. The organization followed 
a military structure and had 32 regiments and 196 companies. The 
Thahan Phran gained considerable publicity and incurred signifi- 
cant casualties during Vietnamese bombardments and local assaults 
along the Cambodian border. 

Metropolitan Police 

Responsible for providing all law enforcement services for the 
capital city of Bangkok and its suburbs, the Metropolitan Police 
was probably the most visible and publicly recognizable of all TNPD 
components. This largely uniformed urban force operated under 
the command of a commissioner, who held the rank of police major 
general and was assisted by six deputy commissioners. Organiza- 
tionally, the force consisted of three divisions, each responsible for 
police services in one of the three urban areas: northern Bangkok, 
southern Bangkok, and Thon Buri. Together they accounted for 
about forty police precincts, which were patrolled around the clock. 

In addition to covering the city with foot patrols, the Metropolitan 
Police maintained motorized units, a canine corps, building guards, 
traffic-control specialists, and law enforcement personnel trained 
to deal with juvenile problems. The Traffic Police Division also 
provided mounted escorts and guards of honor for the king and 
visiting dignitaries and served as a riot-control force to prevent un- 
lawful demonstrations and to disperse unruly crowds within the 
capital city. 

Central Investigation Bureau 

Having jurisdiction over the entire country, the Central Inves- 
tigation Bureau was organized to assist both provincial and 
metropolitan components of the TNPD in preventing and 



274 



National Security 



suppressing criminal activity and in minimizing threats to national 
security. The specialized units of the bureau, including the rail- 
way, marine, highway, and forestry police, employed up-to-date 
technical equipment, law enforcement techniques, and training. 

In addition to the specialized units, five other divisions and offices 
employed modern procedures to assist in investigating and prevent- 
ing crime. The Crime Suppression Division — one of the bureau's 
largest components — was responsible for conducting most of the 
technical investigations of criminal offenses throughout the king- 
dom. Its emergency unit coped with riots and other public disorders, 
sabotage, counterfeiting, fraud, illegal gambling operations, nar- 
cotics trafficking, and the activities of secret societies and organized 
criminal associations. The Special Branch — sometimes referred to 
by critics as the "political police" — was responsible for control- 
ling subversive activities and served as the TNPD's chief intelli- 
gence organization. The Criminal Records Office collected and 
maintained records required in the conduct of police work, including 
dossiers and fingerprints of known criminals and persons suspected 
of wrongdoing. At the well-equipped Scientific Crime Detection 
Laboratory, technicians performed the requisite chemical and phys- 
ical analyses. The Licenses Division registered and licensed fire- 
arms, vehicles, gambling establishments, and various other items 
and enterprises as required by law. 

Education Bureau 

The Police Education Bureau of the TNPD was responsible for 
training police personnel in the latest methods of law enforcement 
and the use of modern weapons. It operated the Police Officers 
Academy at Sam Phran, the detective training school at Bang Kaen, 
the Metropolitan Police Training School at Bang Kaen, and the 
Provincial Police training centers at Nakhon Pathom, Lampang, 
Nakhon Ratchasima, and Yala. 

The bureau also supervised a number of sites established and 
staffed by the BPP to train its field platoons in counterinsurgency 
operations. These sites included a large national facility at Hua 
Hin and smaller facilities in Udon Thani, Ubon Ratchathani, 
Chiang Mai, and Songkhla. 

Criminal Justice 

Until the nineteenth century the source of criminal law in the 
kingdom was ancient Thai law based on the Indian Dharmashastra 
(a Hindu legal code attributed to Manu), which was introduced 
into the country during the Ayutthaya era (see The Ayutthaya Era, 
1350-1767, ch. 1). Over the centuries this code was augmented 



275 



Thailand: A Country Study 



by numerous and sometimes conflicting royal laws and decrees, 
and there was little uniformity in the interpretations and applica- 
tions made by different judges. The resulting tangle of legal con- 
cepts and arbitrary judicial decisions was strongly criticized by 
Western countries whose nationals were brought in as advisers or 
engaged in commerce in the kingdom during the nineteenth cen- 
tury. Objecting to the complexities, cruel punishments, delays, and 
injustices of the legal system, each Western government insisted 
that its nationals and others under its protection in the kingdom 
be subject only to the jurisdiction of its own extraterritorial courts. 
By the middle of the nineteenth century, the system of extra- 
territoriality was firmly established and had further complicated 
an already confusing legal structure. 

Concerned by the limitations on the country's sovereignty and 
encouraged by treaty promises that extraterritoriality would be 
ended when the laws and judiciary were modernized, the Thai rulers 
set about making legal reforms. Whereas earlier kings had 
attempted to codify existing law and eliminate many of the harsher 
punishments, King Mongkut upon his accession to the throne in 
1851 went further. Proclaiming the equality of all people before 
the law, he tried to improve standards of judicial honesty and com- 
petence and to abolish the delays and conflicting rules that had be- 
come so much a part of the judicial administration. 

During the reign of King Chulalongkorn, who succeeded 
Mongkut in 1868, legal reform took a new direction. Whereas previ- 
ous kings had tried to revise and adapt ancient law to meet modern 
needs, Chulalongkorn believed that the problem would be solved 
not by revising the old system but by replacing it. He created the 
Ministry of Justice in 1892, extending its powers to all courts of 
the kingdom. The ministry's first task was to develop a modern 
uniform court structure, a process that continued until 1920, ten 
years after Chulalongkorn' s death. 

During this period existing statutory and customary laws were 
collected and codified, and an enormous volume of new legisla- 
tion was added. In 1897 a commission composed almost entirely 
of French and Belgian lawyers was appointed to draw up a penal 
code, which was promulgated in 1908. The constitutional monar- 
chy established after the coup of 1932 brought about further legal 
reforms, promulgated in 1935 in the Criminal and Civil Proce- 
dures Code. This new legislation was based on Thai and Western 
legal practices that provided substantial safeguards in the adminis- 
tration of justice. In response to these legal reforms and the incor- 
poration into Thai law of some Western concepts of jurisprudence, 
the system of extraterritoriality was completely eliminated by 1938. 



276 



Touring Laotian border front in late 1970s, 
Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn, 
Prime Minister Thanom Kittikachorn, 
and King Bhumibol Adulyadej (left to right) 
Courtesy Royal Thai Embassy 

Further legal refinements resulted in the Criminal Code of 1956, 
which in the late 1980s remained the core of Thai criminal law. 

Criminal Code 

The Criminal Code listed twelve kinds of offenses categorized 
as felonies. The first consisted of crimes against the security of the 
kingdom, including those against the royal family, treason, espio- 
nage, and acts that damaged friendly relations with foreign coun- 
tries. Crimes relating to public administration, such as malfeasance 
in office and offenses against public officials, constituted a second 
major category. Crimes relating to justice, such as perjury or 
offenses against the police or the judiciary, formed a third major 
group. Other felonies included crimes against Buddhism; acts 
against public order and safety; offenses relating to the counter- 
feiting of money, seals, stamps, and documents; crimes against 
trade, including the use of false weights and measures and mis- 
representation of goods; sexual offenses; crimes against the person; 
crimes against liberty and reputation, such as false imprisonment, 
kidnapping, and libel; crimes against property; and offenses such 
as misappropriation and receipt of stolen property. The code also 



277 



Thailand: A Country Study 



listed a wide assortment of petty offenses that were classed as mis- 
demeanors, defined officially as violations punishable by imprison- 
ment for not more than one month, a modest fine, or both. 

Five penalties for violating the code's various provisions were 
stipulated: death, imprisonment, detention (restricted residence), 
fines, and forfeiture of property to the state. The death sentence 
was mandatory for murder or attempted murder of any member 
of the royal family or for any offense likely to endanger the life 
of a king; murder of a public official or anyone assisting a public 
official in the performance of his or her duty; murder committed 
in perpetrating another offense or in an attempt to escape punish- 
ment; matricide or patricide; premeditated murder; or murder ac- 
companied by torture. Other homicides could be punished by death 
but usually brought only imprisonment. Execution was carried out 
by a firing squad. A sentence of life imprisonment usually meant 
incarceration for twenty years, the maximum prison term. 

Children under eight years of age were not subject to criminal 
penalties. Juveniles between the ages of seven and fifteen were not 
fined or imprisoned but could be restricted to their homes, placed 
on probation, or sent to a vocational training school. Juvenile delin- 
quents were, however, admonished by the court, and their par- 
ents were required to show that they had taken measures to ensure 
against repeated violations. Offenses committed by minors between 
the ages of fifteen and seventeen resulted in fines or periods of con- 
finement amounting to one-half the penalties prescribed for adults 
committing the same crimes. 

Procedures in Criminal Law 

Responsibility for the administration of criminal law was shared 
by the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Justice. Appropriate 
branches of the TNPD were charged with detecting and investigat- 
ing crimes, collecting evidence, and bringing the accused before 
the court. The Public Prosecution Department of the Ministry of 
Interior represented the state in criminal proceedings and conducted 
the prosecution. The Ministry of Justice supervised the operation 
of the courts. 

The first step in a criminal case was a preliminary investigation 
carried out by a police officer; the investigation might include 
searches of suspects, their homes, and others thought to be impli- 
cated. The required warrants for these searches stated the reason 
for the search, the identity of the person or place to be searched, 
the name and official position of the officer making the search, and 
the nature of the offense charged. The police generally adhered 



278 



National Security 



to this requirement except in instances covered by the Anti- 
Communist Activities Act of 1979. 

Similar procedures applied for arrest warrants, but a senior police 
officer was permitted to make an arrest without a warrant when 
the offense was of a serious nature, or when someone was appre- 
hended in the commission of a crime or in possession of a weapon 
or instrument commonly used for criminal purposes. Private citizens 
were permitted to arrest without warrant anyone caught in the act 
of committing a serious crime. Arrested suspects were required to 
be taken promptly to a police station, where the arrest warrant was 
read and explained to them. They were then held or released on 
bail. The provisions for bail and security were defined by law. 

After an arrest, a further and more detailed investigation of the 
case was made, but not until the complainant — the state or a pri- 
vate individual — had submitted and signed a full bill of particu- 
lars. At the beginning of this phase, accused persons were warned 
that any statement they made might be used against them in court. 
The investigator was not permitted to use threats, promises, or coer- 
cion to induce the accused to make self- incriminating statements. 

When the investigation was completed, a report was filed with 
the public prosecutor, who then prepared an indictment and gave 
a copy to the accused or his counsel, who entered a plea of guilty 
or not guilty. Based on the plea and the evidence that had been 
gathered, the judge either accepted a case for trial or dismissed 
all charges. Trials were normally held in open court, and the ac- 
cused was presumed to be innocent until proven guilty. If the defen- 
dant had no counsel and wished to be represented, the court 
appointed a defense attorney. During trials, accused persons or 
their counsels could cross-examine prosecution witnesses and reex- 
amine defense witnesses. They could also refuse to answer ques- 
tions or to give evidence that might be self-incriminating. At the 
conclusion of the argument the court usually recessed while the 
judge reached a decision; the court was required, however, to recon- 
vene within three days and the judgment be read to the accused 
in open court. The presiding judge, after pronouncing sentence, 
frequently canceled half of the term of the sentence if the accused 
confessed to his crime. A convicted person wishing to appeal was 
required to do so within fifteen days. The case then was transferred 
to the Court of Appeal, which could reverse or reduce, but not 
increase, the sentence imposed by the original trial court. 

Although periodic revisions of the Criminal Code improved the 
quality of criminal justice, the system still suffered from disparity 
in sentences. In many cases the court experienced difficulty in de- 
termining appropriate sentences because the minimum punishment 



279 



Thailand: A Country Study 

specified by the Criminal Code was often quite severe. In order 
that sentences for the same offense be consistent without hamper- 
ing the court's discretion, judges had a list of standard sentences 
derived from past practices and consideration of other relevant fac- 
tors. These guidelines, however, were not compulsory. To permit 
judges to exercise informed discretion, the Ministry of Justice 
stressed the importance of accurate information about the causes 
of the crime, the nature of the accused, and other circumstances 
pertinent to judicial decisions. Even so, the criminal courts showed 
some difficulty in overcoming the historical tendency to regard 
punishment solely as retribution for past misdeeds and deterrence 
of future antisocial behavior. 

Penal System 

The penal system was administered by the Department of Cor- 
rections within the Ministry of Interior. The government's stated 
policy in operating the system was to use its facilities to reduce crime 
by correcting and rehabilitating offenders rather than only punishing 
them. Rehabilitation of convicted offenders was a relatively recent 
penal concept in Thailand, however, and proper facilities, pro- 
grams, and specially trained penal staff were limited. 

In the late 1980s, the system consisted of forty-six regular penal 
institutions, including seven central prisons, five regional prisons, 
twenty-three prison camps, seven correctional institutions, three 
reformatories, and one detention home. In addition, all metropoli- 
tan, provincial, and district police stations had jails of varying ade- 
quacy for offenders whose sentences did not exceed one year. 

The seven central and five regional prisons housed the majority 
of prisoners with long-term sentences. Khlong Prem Central Prison 
in Bangkok, with a capacity of 6,000 inmates, was one of the oldest 
and largest. A maximum security institution for habitual crimi- 
nals was operated at Nakhon Pathom. Twenty-three prison camps 
were located on Ko Tarutao, an island in the Strait of Malacca. 
The camps accommodated an average of fifty good-conduct 
prisoners, who worked principally in agriculture, preparing them- 
selves for employment after their release. 

Two correctional institutions, one at Ayutthaya and one in Bang- 
kok, held primarily offenders eighteen to twenty-five years old serv- 
ing terms of up to five years. The Women's Correctional Institution 
was also located in Bangkok, and the specialized Medical Correc- 
tional Institution for drug addicts and other prisoners who required 
medical attention was located in Pathum Thani Province north of 
the capital. Minimum security correctional centers were located 
at Rayong and Phitsanulok. 



280 



National Security 



Of the three reformatories, the Ban Lat Yao facility, just north 
of Bangkok, with a capacity of about 2,000, received the majority 
of the more recalcitrant juvenile delinquents. Limited rehabilita- 
tion activities were undertaken there; those who failed to respond 
were sent to a second reformatory near Rayong, which was oper- 
ated on the prison farm principle. A third reformatory at Prachuap 
Khiri Khan, about 200 kilometers southwest of Bangkok, was used 
only to accommodate the overflow from the other two institutions. 

Additional special facilities for juvenile offenders, called obser- 
vation and protection centers, were administered by the Central 
Juvenile Court and the Central Observation and Protection Center 
of the Ministry of Justice. Attached to each juvenile court, the 
centers assisted in caring for and supervising delinquent children 
charged with criminal offenses, both before and after trial. Proba- 
tion officers, social workers, and teachers assigned to the centers 
aided the court by collecting information on the background and 
home environment of offenders, by taking them into custody pend- 
ing trial, by accompanying the defendants into court, and by report- 
ing to the court on their mental and physical conditions. 

Health conditions in all types of penal institutions improved dur- 
ing the 1970s and 1980s, but more hospital facilities were needed. 
Prison education facilities conducted literacy classes for 20,000 
prisoners each year. Vocational training workshops also were es- 
tablished in some prisons. Products from prison labor were sold, 
and 35 percent of the net profit was returned to the prisoners. Some 
of this income could be spent during incarceration, but most of 
it went into a savings fund to assist the prisoner in making a new 
start after release. 

Criminal Activity and the Narcotics Trade 

The crime rate appeared to have risen throughout the 1970s and 
early 1980s — perhaps an inevitable by-product of a society chang- 
ing under the pressures of population increases and economic and 
social modernization. The TNPD reports revealed increases in 
murder, assault, theft, armed robbery, smuggling, and petty vio- 
lations. The major share of these criminal activities occurred in 
Bangkok and some of the larger towns in outlying areas. The high 
incidence of theft by youthful gangs also caused the police consider- 
able concern. 

In general, organized crime appeared to be rare, except for the 
illicit trade in opium, heroin, and cannabis, which persisted in spite 
of ever-increasing government efforts during the 1970s and 1980s 
to cope with a problem that had not only serious domestic impli- 
cations but also escalating international repercussions. The drug 



281 



Thailand: A Country Study 

trade had originated with the growing of poppies as a traditional 
primary cash crop by hill tribes in the Thai section of the notori- 
ous Golden Triangle — a mountainous border region including parts 
of Burma and Laos. For many years peasant cultivators in this 
region produced a major share of the world's opium. 

According to estimates by the Thai government and international 
drug-control agencies, the average crop year yielded from 500 to 
1 ,000 tons of opium, which, when processed in clandestine labora- 
tories, produced from 50 to 100 tons of heroin. An estimated one- 
half of each annual crop found its way into the world market, 
destined primarily for addicts in Western Europe and the United 
States. The other half supplied users in Thailand, Malaysia, and 
other Asian countries. In the late 1980s, it was believed that 
Thailand alone had roughly 500,000 addicts who depended on illicit 
supplies of opium and heroin. For years the Thai government main- 
tained that there were relatively few opium users among the culti- 
vators. But a medical survey, conducted in 1976-77 by health 
researchers from Chulalongkorn University, indicated that the rate 
of addiction in 6 sample villages varied from 6.6 to 16.8 percent 
of all inhabitants over the age of 10. This survey and subsequent 
studies convinced the Thai leadership that trafficking in illegal nar- 
cotics had become a domestic problem requiring action, rather than 
a low-priority international problem. 

The opium-heroin trade of the 1980s stemmed from a history 
of international political machinations in the countries of and around 
the Golden Triangle — a maze compounded in more recent times 
by increasing profitability. The hill tribes grew the opium. Insur- 
gents and separatists in Burma transported it. Yunnan Chinese 
living in northern Thailand taxed it, and Chaozhou Chinese (over- 
seas Chinese living in Bangkok and Hong Kong) bought and ex- 
ported it. Any clear understanding of the complicated system 
requires careful study of the region's ethnic and political hierarchy. 

The Chinese appeared to have been heavily involved in the opi- 
um trade, but that was mainly before the advent of Mao Zedong. 
The Yunnan Chinese who traded in opium were a hodgepodge 
of private armies, including representatives of the Guomindang 
(Kuomintang — KMT) forces that fled China at the time of the com- 
munist takeover in the late 1940s. The rebel Chinese bands in the 
Golden Triangle were the remnants of the KMT who were unable 
to escape to Taiwan but instead sought refuge in Burma. Over the 
intervening years their fanatical anticommunist attitude kept them 
active in southern China as well as in Burma, Laos, and northern 
Thailand. For many years their fierce independence and swash- 
buckling military courage was regarded by many Western 



282 



King Bhumibol Adulyadej meeting with hill tribespeople 
participating in crop substitution program 
Courtesy Royal Thai Embassy 

governments as helpful in stemming communism in Southeast Asia. 
That attitude, however, predated the international heroin problem 
and the rapprochement between the West and China. 

The Chaozhou Chinese (originally from Chaozhou District, 
Guangdong Province) traced their roots in drug trafficking back 
to the days of organized crime in Shanghai after China's defeat 
in the Opium War (1839-42). Operating their maze of syndicates 
from Hong Kong, the Chaozhou Chinese had a virtual monopoly 
on the illicit opium and heroin trade, and the technology they used 
in converting opium to more easily transportable heroin was handed 
on to Chinese living in Thailand. The syndicates' intricate system 
of international couriers operated within Thailand to transport drugs 
both to local dealers and to the vast array of worldwide customers. 

Faced with increasing use of illicit drugs among young people 
in the United States in the 1960s and a rising incidence of 
addiction among its servicemen in Vietnam, the United States 
government focused on the flow of heroin from Thailand. On Sep- 
tember 28, 1971, the two governments signed a memorandum of 
understanding, reaffirming their intention to cooperate with each 
other in combating the illicit international traffic in dangerous drugs. 
Under the terms of the accord, the Thai government agreed to step 
up its efforts to eliminate poppy production and to control narcotics 



283 



Thailand: A Country Study 

traffic within the country. The United States agreed to provide sup- 
port, such as training, equipment, advisory assistance, and funds, 
to improve the effectiveness of the Thai programs. For several years 
the cooperative efforts of the two governments produced limited 
results, partly because certain corrupt senior Thai officials in the 
bureaucracy, the army, and the police had personal interests in 
the drug trade. 

By the 1980s, successive Thai governments had played an in- 
creasingly effective role in the suppression and control of illicit drugs 
originating in Southeast Asia. The agents of the Narcotics Sup- 
pression Center, established under the TNPD, were highly regarded 
by foreign narcotics representatives for their efficiency and incor- 
ruptibility. Personnel of the Provincial Police and the BPP received 
training in narcotics work, and new equipment — including 
helicopters — had been procured to aid in aerial surveillance. Coor- 
dination between the TNPD specialists and Interpol provided the 
Thai with valuable information and suggestions from the police 
representatives of countries such as Canada, France, Britain, 
Sweden, the Netherlands, and the United States as well as the 
metropolitan police of Hong Kong. Many foreign governments, 
including the United States, assigned professional narcotics 
specialists to their embassies in Bangkok to work with the Thai 
government on the illicit drug problem. 

Thai citizens, threatened by the problems stemming from drug 
abuse in their country, strongly supported such measures as preven- 
tive education, treatment, and rehabilitation. In addition, tough 
amendments were added to the Criminal Code to deter those 
trafficking in narcotics. Legislation passed in March 1979 man- 
dated the death penalty or life imprisonment for persons convicted 
of possessing, manufacturing, or transporting more than 100 grams 
of heroin. Despite limited success in the legal and enforcement areas 
of antinarcotics programs, the Thai government and its foreign 
advisers believed that the most logical long-term solution lay in 
persuading the opium-growing hill people to abandon their tradi- 
tional crop and switch instead to other cash crops, such as coffee, 
beans, tea, and tobacco. This effort received aid from the United 
Nations, which started a pilot project along these lines in 1973. 
The United States provided funds to assist in the development of 
a highland marketing system for the hill tribes' produce and for 
a system of roads to provide growers with easier access to lowland 
consumers. 

During the 1980s, as the number of narcotics addicts in Thailand 
continued to grow, the Thai government renewed its attention to 
narcotics eradication and interdiction programs. These efforts 



284 



National Security 



received strong support from the United States and other coun- 
tries. Thailand and Burma, always suspicious neighbors, increased 
cooperation in the effort to eliminate narcotics traffic along their 
border. The two governments arranged for limited intelligence ex- 
change on narcotics refineries and trade routes along the border 
and also cooperated in combined tactical missions against the nar- 
cotics traffic. Progress in the battle against illicit narcotics was slow, 
partly because of the vested interests of certain influential figures 
within Thailand. It was also difficult to combat the problem be- 
cause of the remote and rugged terrain and the international border. 
Observers predicted drug traffic would continue for many years 
to come and might never be completely eradicated. 

* * * 

Although an abundance of material exists concerning various 
aspects of national security in Thailand, there are no definitive 
studies in English that provide the entire picture. Readers interested 
in further details on the country's insurgency problem may con- 
sult former United States Agency for International Development 
officer Robert F. Zimmerman's succinct 1976 article, "Insurgen- 
cy in Thailand," and former United States special assistant for 
counterinsurgency George K. Tanham's informative book Trial 
in Thailand. Hans U. Luther's extensive article, "Peasants and State 
in Contemporary Thailand," provides an informative explanation 
of the insurgency's socioeconomic basis. Thomas Lobe's well- 
researched and provocative monograph, United States National Security 
Policy and Aid to the Thailand Police, offers interesting exploration 
of the myriad problems encountered in counterinsurgency efforts 
through the mid-1970s. Moreover, a clear picture of the roles and 
activities of the kingdom's prime internal security force is offered 
in Thomas Lobe and David Morell's chapter, "Thailand's Border 
Patrol Police: Paramilitary Political Power," in Supplementary Military 
Forces, edited by Louis A. Zurcher and Gwyn Harries-Jenkins. An 
understanding of national security policy is greatly assisted by the 
chapter on Thailand in Strategies of Survival by Charles E. Morrison 
and Astri Suhrke. But no analysis of the national security situa- 
tion, using publicly available sources, would be possible without 
the extensive coverage provided by the periodical Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review. (For further information and complete citations, see 
Bibliography.) 



285 



Appendix 



Table 

1 Metric Conversion Coefficients 

2 Chakkri Dynasty, 1782-1988 

3 Population Growth, 1911-85 

4 School Enrollment, 1980-84 

5 Gross Domestic Product by Sector, 1983-86 

6 Government Expenditures, by Selected Years, 1978-86 

7 Balance of Payments, 1982-86 

8 Principal Exports, Selected Years, 1981-86 

9 Exports by Sector, Selected Years, 1981-86 

10 Foreign Trade, 1981-86 

11 Imports by Sector, 1981-86 

12 Production of Major Crops, Selected Years, 1960-86 

13 Forest and Fisheries Production, 1979-85 

14 Prime Ministers, 1932-87 

15 Parliamentary Elections, 1979-86 

16 Defense Expenditures and Manpower Levels, Fiscal Years 

1980-86 

17 Major Army Equipment, 1987 

18 Major Navy Equipment, 1987 

19 Major Air Force Equipment, 1987 



287 



Appendix 



Table 1. Metric Conversion Coefficients and Factors 



When you know Multiply by To find 



Millimeters 0.04 inches 

Centimeters 0.39 inches 

Meters 3.3 feet 

Kilometers 0.62 miles 

Hectares (10,000 m 2 ) 2.47 acres 

Square kilometers 0.39 square miles 

Cubic meters 35.3 cubic feet 

Liters 0.26 gallons 

Kilograms 2.2 pounds 

Metric tons 0.98 long tons 

1.1 short tons 

2,204 pounds 

Degrees Celsius 9 degrees Fahrenheit 

(Centigrade) divide by 5 

and add 32 



Table 2. Chakkri Dynasty, 1782-1987 







Conventional Form 


Systematic 


Regnal Title 


Reign 


Used in the West 


Romanization 1 


Rama I 2 


1782-1809 


Yot Fa 


Phutthayotfa Chulalok 


Rama II 2 


1809-1824 


Loet La 


Phutthaloetla Naphalai 


Rama III 


1824-1851 


Nang Klao 


Nangklao 


Rama IV 


1851-1868 


Mongkut 


Chomklao 


Rama V 


1868-1910 


Chulalongkorn 


Chunlachomklao 


Rama VI 


1910-1925 


Vajiravudh 


Mongkutklao 


Rama VII 


1925-1935 3 


Prajadhipok 


Pokklao 


Rama VIII 


1935-1946 4 


Ananda Mahidol 


Anantha Mahidon 


Rama IX 


1946 5 - 


Bhumibol Adulyadej 


Phumiphon Adunlayadet 



1 As adopted by the Library of Congress, except for the omission of diacritical markings 

2 Conferred posthumously. 

3 Abdicated; died 1941. 

4 Regency until 1945; died 1946. 

5 Regency until 1951. 



289 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Table 3. Population Growth, 1911-85 

Census Total Rate of Increase 

Year Population (in percentage) 1 



1911 8,266,408 

1919 9,207,355 

1929 11,506,207 

1937 14,464,105 

1947 17,442,689 

1960 26,257,916 

1970 34,397,374 

1980 44,824,540 

1985 51,571,000 2 



1.4 

2.2 
3.0 
1.9 
3.2 
3.4 
2.6 
2.5 



Average annual increase during the period between censuses. 
Estimated. 



Table 4. School Enrollment, 1980-84 



Level of Education 


1980 


1981 


1982 


1983 


1984 


Preprimary 


349,827 


379,400 


408,687 


471,597 


532,097 


Primary 


7,370,846 


7,449,219 


7,413,571 


7,272,153 


7,229,064 


Secondary 












Lower secondary . . . 


1,343,937 


1,104,339 


1,188,911 


1,222,037 


1,302,131 


Upper secondary . . . 


266,349 


468,248 


516,199 


532,888 


557,095 


Total secondary . . 


1,610,286 


1,572,587 


1,705,110 


1,754,925 


1,859,226 


Teacher training 


70,837 


71,978 


85,016 


76,957 


70,877 




356,700 


492,597 


539,865 


588,470 


577,147 


University* 












Undergraduate .... 


71,096 


88,796 


96,662 


102,696 


106,562 


Graduate 


11,092 


11,305 


12,178 


13,418 


14,257 


Total university . . 


82,188 


100,101 


108,840 


116,114 


120,819 


TOTAL 


9,840,684 


10,065,882 


10,261,089 


10,280,216 


10,389,230 



* Excludes Ramkhamhaeng University and Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University, in 1980 excluded 
Srinakharinwirot University. 



Source: Based on information from Thailand, Office of the Prime Minister, National Statisti- 
cal Office, Statistical Handbook of Thailand, 1985, Bangkok, 40-41. 



290 



Appendix 



c — 

u O 



S3 (X 

c Q 



(2 ° 



<£> co r-^ "(O-H^Dcnio^Nmcnco 



IT) (71 ^ Ol N 

O <0 ffi CO 

to in 03 o_ 

(C in co co 

(X CM — —i CO 



cm co ^« 

CM CM 



« « n ^ n 

in o o co 

O co co co m 

N ^ (N CO 



N CO IN CO 
CM — c i-J O) 



CO CD CO 
^ (N CM N N 

m co — « cm cm 



CM *— i CM ■>— i 
1X5 CO »-H CM 



co o (O * co 
^ io ^ * 
a co rt- ^ * 



isrtCMNNincooiaiinm 

■trxCOCONCJ)*OCOCMM 

com^O'-'COOiNOi^coco 
" o m 



CO'-iCMCOCMCMCMCOm 
CMduONoicOCO'-'^ 



"tCOOOlOCNCOlOIN^ 
rtNNlOcONOCOlOCN 
OcoO-<NOl(£-imcO 



m cm 

*-H CO 



CNCOCOffim^CMIN^CON 

cv oi in co" od co ^ * d d 



rtNCM^COCON^M'tm 

aiinNcocooiNcocooco 
NiNNcoiooimcortNin 



coo^cooaicofNiot^ai 

rtffliO'HcdtvNrt^dN 



o o 

CO o 
CM 





CC 


CM 




o 




o 


o 


CO 




o 




CC 




m 


CC 






CO 




CO 


CO 


CM 


m 


<sD 






to 


CO 


m 


CM 




CM 


CC 


o 
















OTl 


CM 


CM 


















CD 



t\ g « 



T3 

C 

bo 

c c 
S o 



6 § 
a 6 



291 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Table 6. Government Expenditures, Selected Years, 1978-86 
(in millions of baht) * 

1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 



Economic classification 

Current ... 58,518 94,370 125,904 154,481 173,557 

Capital 18,991 26,603 31,113 27,747 30,722 

Major functional classification 

Economic services 17,012 22,804 27,902 28,573 29,928 

Social services 23,831 35,474 47,940 55,419 60,156 

Defense 15,310 24,398 31,350 36,034 41,125 

General administration . 9,526 17,705 18,134 24,304 25,761 

Unallocable items 11,830 20,592 31,691 37,898 47,309 



TOTAL 77,509 120,973 157,017 182,228 204,279 



* For value of the baht — see Glossary. 

Source: Based on information from Bank of Thailand, Quarterly Bulletin, Bangkok, June 
1987, 36. 



292 



Appendix 



CO CO 

d <y> 

CO CT> m 

^ 

CO 

CM CM 




o 


to 


CM 


CO 






co 




in 


C?) 


o 


CO 


CM 


in 


tO 


CO 


CO 


to 






CM 


cc 


co 


a> 


cr> 


CM 


tO 


CT) 




CC 


m 


CM 




r^- 


n 






CO 


tO 


m 


co 


CM 




CO 


co 






CO 




o 








to 


m 




"*< 










CM 










i 









t-h m 

to co 

co 



cm to in 
in n co 

tO CO CM 



OOiO 

to co 
co 
co" 




-a v 

s ° 

„ » c e 
8.8.11 



1) a) 
<» c 

c £ 

on qj 

o 
o 
be 



<u C 
Z D 



C o 
S T3 



a o 



293 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Table 8. Principal Exports, Selected Years, 1981-86 
(in millions of baht) 1 



Item 



Rice 

Rubber products 

Maize 

Cassava products 

Tin 

Sugar » 

Integrated circuits 

Textile products 

Marine products 2 

Precious stones 

Tobacco leaves 

Mung beans 

Frozen fowl 

Sorghum 

Fresh fruit 

Orchids 

Raw cotton 

Kapok fiber 

Tungsten 

Coffee 

Fluorite 

Canned pineapple 

Molasses 

Iron or steel pipes 

Leather gloves 

Artificial flowers 

Wall and floor tiles 

Wood products 

Jute products 

Footwear 

Furniture 

Plastic products 

Jewelry 

Other 

TOTAL 



1981 


1983 


1985 


1986 


26,366 


20,157 


22,524 


20,315 


10,841 


11,787 


13,567 


15,116 


8,349 


8,486 


7,700 


9,261 


16,446 


15,387 


14,969 


19,086 


9,091 


5,265 


5,647 


3,096 


9,572 


6,338 


6,247 


7,271 


6,163 


5,829 


8,248 


12,818 


12,570 


14,351 


23,578 


31,268 


7,859 


10,682 


15,934 


23,013 


4,486 


6,214 


6,350 


8,150 


1,739 


1,791 


1,580 


1,487 


1,693 


1,552 


2,284 


1,463 


1,187 


946 


1,467 


3,121 


904 


790 


1,048 


657 


426 


525 


684 


736 


402 


354 


490 


387 


267 


268 


210 


96 


285 


250 


230 


205 


379 


132 


150 


64 


231 


452 


883 


1,722 


332 


289 


363 


230 


2,039 


1,871 


3,292 


3,183 


696 


609 


758 


1,018 


580 


429 


1,649 


1,502 


242 


223 


347 


420 


383 


481 


913 


1,146 


997 


302 


315 


519 


1,367 


1,336 


1,901 


2,235 


1,245 


1,100 


1,561 


1,265 


956 


1,743 


2,368 


3,185 


707 


981 


1,317 


1,866 


689 


938 


1,262 


1,414 


526 


1,028 


2,168 


5,014 


23,756 


23,586 


41,362 


51,054 


153,001 


146,472 


193,366 


233,383 



1 For value of the baht — see Glossary. 

2 Includes fresh and canned fish, crustaceans, and mollusks. 

Source: Based on information from Bank of Thailand, Quarterly Bulletin, Bangkok, June 
1987, 54-57. 



294 



Appendix 



Table 9. Exports by Sector, Selected Years, 1981-86 
(in millions of baht) * 



Sector 


1981 


1983 


1985 


1986 


Agriculture 


72,998 


66,484 


73,398 


79,397 


Fishing 


6,632 


8,225 


10,590 


14,853 


Forestry 


143 


109 


365 


620 


Mining 


11,814 


6,806 


10,126 


6,283 


Manufacturing 


54,743 


61,358 


95,615 


129,170 


Samples and other unclassified goods . 


2,632 


1,340 


1,518 


1,772 




4,039 


2,150 


1,754 


1,288 


TOTAL 


153,001 


146,472 


193,366 


233,383 



* For value of the baht — see Glossary 



Source: Based on information from Bank of Thailand, Quarterly Bulletin, Bangkok, June 
1987, 52-53. 



295 



Thailand: A Country Study 



co (O cm in cd 
co *-h m — < o m 

co cm a CO ID 



m in 



co m 



CO CM 
CD CM 

co m 



CD CO — i — . 



CO 




!>. 


CO 






m 




CD 


cd 


co 




m 


CD 


m 


m 




m 


CD 


co 


CM 


CO 




in 




O 


CO 




m 


CO 


CD 


CM 


CO 




lO 




CM 






O 


m 


CO 


CO 


CD 


CO 


o 


CO 


<D 




in 




CD 


co 


m 


m 


O 


in 


CO 




m 






co 




CO 




in 




CM 










m 


<£> 


CO 


m 


CD 


































CM 


<D 





















r^m mcD <n O ^ co 
CO n CD ^ m o m 

CM— i CM in O -100 



lO CO — 1 



CM CD 

co" ~h~ 



ct> m 

CD <n 
m co 



— i O CO CD 

CM in CD CO O 

CM t-~- * O CM r-» 



—i CO 

<£) CO 

m 



in 
m m 
m eo 



ID CM 



cm 

m o 
CD 



CD 

co m 
CD o 



CO CD 
CO CO 

co m 



m cm 



-h CD 
in —i 
CM CO 



1 * 



R 2 



CO O CM 

in co m 

O CD CO CD 



CO Tt* 

m cm 
cd m 



CM CO 

o in 
in cm 



co co id in 



e5 



o o 

s 



o o 
— a 
x a 



o 
bo 

a 
o 
X 



296 



Appendix 



CT> 


m 




o 


CM 




CO 
















to 


CT 


co 


o 


to 


CO 


o 




CT> 


CO 


CO 




CD 


co 




CTj 




to 


o 




CM 


CM 




CO 


CT 


CM 


CT, 


to 


CM 


CO 


o 


CO 






lO 


00 


to 


r^- 


CO 








CO 


CT) 


CO 


CT. 


co 


m 


CT 




CO 


m 


m 


o 


CM 


CT 


CM 


m 


















m 










CM 


to 


CM 


















CM 














































co 


O 


to 


o 


CO 


co 


CO 


CO 


m 


m 


CO 


o 


to 


CO 


CT) 


CM 


CM 


CO 


o 






00 


CM 


to 




m 




CO 


CT> 


CM 




o 


CO 


CT) 


CO 


CM 


CO 




CM 




co 


o 


CO 




i>. 


to 


O 




co 


co 






r» 


CO 


O 




CO 


m 




CM 


m 


CM 


CT) 










CT) 


m 


co 




o 






CO 












to 




to 










CO 


CM 








co 


CM 


CO 


00 


00 














































CO 


CM 


CM 


CO 




t^- 


to 


CO 


CO 


CT) 


m 


<o 


CT) 




CM 


co 


CM 




o 


o 


CO 


o 


o 


m 


CM 


CT) 


CM 




co 


CT) 


l^. 


CO 




CO 






CT 


o 


CO 






CM 


CM 


CO 


CM 


to 




to 


o 




t^. 


CO 




r- 


to 

*• 


CM 


CT) 




o 




t^- 


CO 


o 


co 








CO 


CT 

** 


m 




CT) 




to 




CT) 


CM 






CM 


CO 


m 


CO 










CM 




CM 








CM 


CM 


CM 


o 


CM 














































CO 


co 


CO 


CO 


CM 


CM 


CM 


CT) 


o 


o 


CO 


CO 


m 


m 


CM 


m 


CO 


CM 


m 


co 


CM 




to 


CO 


m 


CO 




CM 




to 


CO 


m 




CT) 




CT) 


o 


(O 




CT) 


CO 




o 


CO 


<0 


CO 


CM 


o 


CT> 


o 


CT) 


to 










CT) 


CO 


CO 


m 




o 


o 




CO 


(O 


m 


CO 


to 


m 


CM 


<*< 


CO 










to 




CM 


CM 


m 


CM 


CO 


m 


_r 


CM 


CO 


m 


CM 


' 






CM 




co 




CT 


^H 












































CM 


CM 




m 


in 




o 


CT> 


CM 


CO 


o 


r^. 


m 






r>- 


CO 


m 


CM 


o 


m 


r^- 




CT 




o 


m 


m 




© 


CO 






CM 


CO 




m 


CM 




o 




r-~. 




o 




co 


m 


to 


m 


CM 


lO 




en 


m 




** 


o 


o 


o 


CT) 


CO 


to 


m 




o 


CM 


CM 


CO 


** 


co 

*~ 


to 




CM 


CM 




CM 




m 






CO 


m 


CO 


CM 


m 




CM 


CM 




CM 


■sj-i 










CM 


o 


to 






























CM 
















CM 


CM 




CT. 




CT) 


m 








CO 


CO 




to 




co 




to 


CM 


00 








CO 






ct 






CO 


CT) 




to 


m 


CO 




CO 


CO 




CO 




CO 


m 


CM 




£^ 


CO 


o 


• CT 


CO 


CD 


CT) 


o 


m 


m 


CT) 




co 


CO 


CT) 


CT) 


CO 






to 






CO 


o 


CT> 


to 


CT) 




o 








































































































1/3 


co 


CO 










CO 


CO 


CO 


CO 




CO 




CO 


CO 


CO 


CO 


co 






Sh 


i_ 


Sh 
















Sh 


Sh 


Sh 


Sh 


u 


Sh 


Ih 


Ih 


Sh 


Sh 










c 


o 


O 


O 


O 


O 


o 


o 


c 


O 


o 


o 


O 


o 


O 


O 


O 


O 


O 


O 


c 


O 


O 


o 




a 


a 


a, 


a 


a 


Cl 


a 


a 


CL 




a 


O- 




a 


CL 


a 


a 


a 


CL 


a 


Cl 


a 




Ex 


g 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 


Ex 


Im 



ho 
C 



297 



Thailand: A Country Study 



.8 

s 

c3 



1 


o 




CO 


CO 


CO 


CO 


<Ti 1 


CO 




CO 










- 


















CM 




co 










CO 


CO 
















CM 


CM 


1 


o 


m 




CM 




CXl 


cr> 1 




lO 


co 


CM 


<X) 


(£> 




co 








co 






co 




l>- 




co 










CM 


CO 


cn 


m 














CM 



cm r^- 

CO ^2 CO CO 



co co en 









CO 




CO 


10 


5 1 




CO 




LO 


CM 




m 




CO 


CM 


o 




lO 








o 






(£> 








CM 




LO 


CD 

















CT> CO 
CM 

cm 



CM CO 

^£> en 



o o o o o o 
o~ d. a a, o- q. 
x a x a x c 



^ CM 



CM CT> 

r-- o 



O O 

a a, 
^ E 



o 

C 

pq 



3 w o 

■Sb-S XJ 



S 1 



298 



Appendix 



Table 11. Imports by Sector, 1981-86 
(in millions of baht) * 

Category 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 

Consumer goods 
Nondurable 



Food and beverages 



yiairv nrnHnrt<5 


2,451 


1,937 


2,447 


2,418 


2,589 


2,528 


Cereals and derivatives 


1,101 


730 


947 


782 


880 


843 


Fruits and vegetables 


716 


715 


896 


991 


794 


523 


Coffee, tea, and spices 


166 


191 


237 


190 


261 


263 


Other 


1,532 


1,417 


1,530 


1,670 


1,840 


1,946 


Total fonrl /inH 














beverages 


5,966 


4,990 


6,057 


6,051 


6,364 


6,103 


Tobacco products 


71 


100 


85 


105 


1 1 1 


113 


Toiletries and cleaning: 














products 


991 


957 


1,165 


1,230 


1,442 


1,519 


Clothing and footwear 


1,054 


1,756 


2,158 


2,065 


1,816 


2,111 


rVledicinal and pharma~ 
















2 377 


2 496 


2 786 


2 733 


3 072 


3,136 


Total nondurable . . . 


10,459 


10,299 


12,251 


12,184 


12,805 


12,982 


Durable 














Household goods 


2,573 


2,471 


2,885 


3,044 


3,524 


3,646 


Electrical appliances 


3,519 


3,625 


5,263 


5,549 


5,682 


5,777 


Wood and cork products 


126 


122 


121 


103 


115 


98 


T pathpr anrl lp^th^r 
















JO 


in 


4.7 


/ J 




4.09 




7A 
/V 


O 1 

ol 




1 ol 


1 oo 


1 no 


Bicycles, motorcycles, 














and parts 


1,225 


1,024 


1,310 


1,284 


947 


842 


Small arms 


253 


253 


326 


322 


496 


617 




7,804 


7,606 


10,057 


10,508 


11,161 


11,484 


Total consumer 
















18,263 


17,905 


22,308 


22,692 


23,966 


24,466 


itermediate products and raw 














materials 














Chiefly for consumer goods 














Fish and fish products . . . 


481 


648 


984 


2,020 


3,754 


7,462 


Animal and vegetable 














crude materials 


3,149 


2,782 


2,987 


4,010 


2,494 


3,129 


Tobacco, unprocessed . . . 


865 


1,639 


603 


974 


1,409 


1,252 


Lumber and wood 














products 


3,642 


2,992 


3,783 


3,489 


3,677 


3,501 


Textile fibers 


3,915 


3,247 


4,516 


5,388 


5,673 


5,638 




3,443 


2,451 


3,882 


4,507 


4,919 


4,825 


Synthetic 


472 


796 


634 


881 


754 


813 


Textile yarn and thread . . 


1,278 


1,094 


1,399 


1,514 


1,445 


2,359 




2,676 


2,044 


2,810 


3,459 


3,397 


4,225 


Jewelry, including silver 














bars 


1,352 


1,772 


3,141 


2,591 


2,541 


4,149 


Paper and paperboard . . . 


2,856 


2,535 


3,109 


2,914 


3,656 


3,370 




18,011 


16,138 


20,790 


20,730 


23,061 


26,106 


Total chiefly for 














consumer goods .... 


38,225 


34,891 


44,122 


47,089 


51,107 


61,191 



299 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Table 11. — Continued 



Category 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 

Chiefly for capital goods 

Crude minerals 1,055 1,035 1,105 1,150 1,318 966 

Base metals 18,804 17,134 21,247 21,374 23,347 22,176 

Iron and steel 12,039 11,323 13,860 14,035 15,942 15,737 

Other 6,765 5,811 7,387 7,339 7,405 6,439 

Total chiefly for 

capital goods 19,859 18,169 22,352 22,524 24,665 23,142 

Total intermediate 
products and raw 

materials 58,084 53,060 66,474 69,613 75,772 84,333 

Capital goods 

Fertilizers and pesticides . 5,180 4,723 6,232 6,162 6,748 6,660 

Cement 175 8 27 19 17 29 

Construction materials ... 412 242 292 298 317 227 

Tubes and pipes 650 458 824 834 1,066 619 

Glass and other mineral 

manufactures 1,443 1,183 1,527 1,256 1,455 1,483 

Rubber manufactures 504 511 620 630 697 675 

Metal manufactures 5,147 2,986 4,046 3,952 4,977 4,221 

Nonelectrical machinery 

and parts 25,842 21,172 33,061 34,992 34,720 32,299 

Electrical machinery and 

parts 11,080 11,422 16,372 18,085 15,848 25,561 

Scientific and optical 

instruments 2,991 3,256 4,598 4,088 4,356 4,779 

Aircraft and ships 3,222 2,171 1,427 3,176 3,493 1,642 

Locomotives and rolling 

stock 339 60 788 115 1,710 121 

Total capital goods .. 56,985 48,192 69,814 73,607 75,404 78,316 

Other imports 

Vehicles and parts 9,568 7,687 11,416 11,834 9,292 8,939 

Petroleum Products 65,100 60,765 57,065 57,353 56,719 32,354 

Gold bullion n.a. 20 35 32 41 160 

Miscellaneous 8,746 8,987 9,497 10,024 9,975 12,790 

Total other imports . . 83,414 77,459 78,013 79,243 76,027 54,243 

TOTAL 216,746 196,616 236,609 245,155 251,169 241,358 

n.a. — not available. 

* For value of the baht — see Glossary. 

Source: Based on information from Bank of Thailand, Quarterly Bulletin, Bangkok, June 
1987, 44-47. 



300 



Appendix 



Table 12. Production of Major Crops, Selected Years, 1960-86 
(in thousands of tons) 



Crop 


1960 


1970 


1975 


19! 


}1 


1985 


1986 


Rice 


6,770.0 


13,410 


.0 


13,386.0 


17,800 


.0 


20,599.0 


19,026.0 


Rubber 


171.8 


287 


.2 


348.7 


502 


.0 


722.0 


790.0 


Maize 


543.9 


1,938 


,2 


2,863.2 


4,000 


.0 


5,030.0 


4,092.0 


Cassava 


1,222.0 


3^431 


.0 


8,100.0 


17,744, 


.0 


19,263.0 


15,255.0 


Sugarcane 


5,382.0 


6,585 


.9 


19,910.0 


30,260 


.0 


24,000.0 


24,410.0 


Mung beans 


60.3 


150 


.5 


120.6 


283 


.7 


323.4 


325.0 


Ground nuts 


152.0 


124 


.9 


99.9 


146 


.5 


171.0 


171.0 




25.6 


50 


.4 


113.9 


131 


.5 


307.8 


350.0 




18.6 


20 


.2 


17.4 


28 


.5 


25.4 


32.6 


Coconuts 


1,040.0 


714 


.0 


677.0 


709 


.6 


980.8 


890.0 


Castor beans 


43.0 


42 


.7 


38.5 


36 


,0 


32.9 


28.5 


Cotton 


45.5 


26, 


8 


28.7 


175, 


.7 


101.5 


57.0 


Jute and kenaf 


187.5 


384. 


.9 


307.6 


208 





266.0 


240.0 


Kapok and bambax 


















fiber 


n.a. 


103 


.0 


106.4 


39 


.2 


43.5 


41.6 


Tobacco leaves 




















n.a. 


20 


.2 


36.9 


51, 


.6 


35.2 


31.3 



n.a. — not available. 

Source: Based on information from Bank of Thailand, Quarterly Bulletin, Bangkok, June 
1987, 75. 



301 



Thailand: A Country Study 



d ^ * °i 

• in o 

c co en 

r^- <£> CO 



(N ^ lO lO (N 
CO _; CO ^5 t-h 
* c CO - * 

oo 



CO T-H 



• in 10 



^ • Oi N N 

. Co 

CO J ID O 

io c «*< m 

ID CO CO 



x> co 

00 CO 



cm -<f <y> o CT> 

co oS m' co 

r> co co m 

cm tr> cm 



CO 



CO CO N CN 

r-^ ■•— i m m 

C7i m cr> co co 

m co to cm 



o o 
co in 

(£5 



4 

c 



l£) * ^ <N O 

oS t>> co in co 

CM CTi CM '-i 

t-< <£> CM CO 



co co 
— « co 

CO r-H 



3 S 



5.^ 



>4 be qj 

(U C3 *-• 

h ix 



53 C 
O 



« 8 

•J I 



. -a 

cm a 

CO Rj 
CT> 

^ CO 

• s e 

bo , 

•S o 



J3 PQ 



302 



Appendix 



Table 14. Prime Ministers, 1932-87 



Prime Minister 



Phraya Manopakonnitithada (Phraya 

Manopakorn; Kot Hutasing) 

Phraya Phahonphonphayuhasena (Phot 

Phahonyothin) 

Luang Phibunsongkhram (Plaek 

Phibunsongkhram; Phibun) 

Khuang Aphaiwong . 

Thawi Bunyaket 

M.R.W. Seni Pramoj 

Khuang Aphaiwong 

Pridi Phanomyong 

Luang Thamrongnawasawat (Thawan 

Thamrongnawasawat) 

Khuang Aphaiwong 

Luang Phibunsongkhram 

Pote Sarasin 

Thanom Kittikachorn 

Sarit Thanarat 

Thanom Kittikachorn 

Sanya Dharmasakti (Sanya Thammasak) . . 

M.R.W. Seni Pramoj 

M.R.W. Kukrit Pramoj 

M.R.W. Seni Pramoj 

Thanin Kraivichien . 

Kriangsak Chomanand 

Prem Tinsulanonda 



Term of Office 



August 28, 1932-June 20, 1933 

June 21, 1933-December 16, 1938 

December 16, 1938-July 24, 1944 
August 1, 1944- August 17, 1945 
August 31, 1945-September 17, 1945 
September 17, 1945-January 31, 1946 
January 31, 1946-March 18, 1946 
March 24, 1946- August 21, 1946 

August 23, 1946-November 8, 1947 
November 10, 1947-April 8, 1948 
April 8, 1948-September 16, 1957 
September 21, 1957-December 26, 1957 
January 1, 1958-October 20, 1958 
February 9, 1959-December 8, 1963 
December 9, 1963-October 14, 1973 
October 14, 1973-February 15, 1975 
February 15, 1975-March 6, 1975 
March 14, 1975-January 12, 1976 
April 20, 1976-October 6, 1976 
October 8, 1976-October 20, 1977 
November 11, 1977-February 28, 1980 
March 3, 1980- 



303 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Table 15. Parliamentary Elections, 1979-86 



Participants 1979 1983 1986 
Political party 

Democrat (Prachathipat) 32 56 100 

Chart Thai (Thai Nation) 1 38 73 1 63 

Social Action (Kit Sangkhom) 83 92 51 

United Democracy (Saha Prachathipatai) — — 38 

Prachakorn Thai (Thai People) 32 36 24 

Ruam Thai (Thai Unity) — — 19 

Rassadorn (People) — — 18 

Community Action (Kit Prachakhorn) — — 15 

Progressive (Koa Nar) — 3 9 

Muan Chon (Mass) — — 3 

National Democracy (Chart Prachathipatai) — 15 3 

Liberal (Seriniyom) — — 1 

Democratic Labor (Raeng Ngam Prachathipatai) . . — 1 

New Force (Phalang Mai) 8 1 

Puangchon Chao Thai (Thai Mass) — 1 

Rak Thai (Love Thai) — — 

Freedom and Justice (Seritham) 21 — — 

Siam Democracy (Siam Prachathipatai) — 18 — 

Other parties 24 7 — 

Independents 2 63 24 — 

Total 301 324 347 

Number of participating political parties 38 14 16 

Number of candidates 1,630 1,862 3,810 

Voter turnout (in percentage) 44 51 61 

— means did not participate. 

1 After the 1983 election, this party increased its strength to 108 by absorbing most independents and 
members of minor parties. 

2 Independents were required by a 1983 law to join existing parties. 



304 



Appendix 



Table 16. Defense Expenditures and Manpower Levels, 
Fiscal Years 1980-86 





Defense 


Defense as 










Expenditures 2 


Percentage 


Defense as 






Fiscal 


(in billions 


of Total 


Percentage 


Military 


Paramilitary 


Year 1 


of baht) 3 


Expenditures 


of GNP 4 


Manpower 


Forces 5 



1980 22.4 20.1 4.0 230,000 67,000 

1981 27.7 19.5 3.8 233,000 67,000 

1982 33.1 30.4 4.2 235,000 71,000 

1983 35.5 30.3 4.2 256,000 71,000 

1984 39.4 30.6 4.2 256,000 73,000 

1985 41.4 30.8 4.2 265,000 75,000 

1986 41.2 30.8 4.3 273,000 80,000 



1 Fiscal year extends from October 1 through the following September 30, e.g., fiscal year 1980 began 
October 1, 1979. 

2 Accounts do not include expenditures for internal security or major military equipment purchases. 

3 For value of the baht — see Glossary. 

4 Gross national product. 

5 Includes Thahan Phran, Rangers, Village Defense Corps, Border Patrol Police, Marine Police, Police 
Aviation, and Special Action Forces. 



305 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Table 17. Major Army Equipment, 1987 



Type and 
Description 



Country 
of Origin 



In 

Inventory 



Tanks 

M-48A5 Patton (medium with 
90mm gun) 

M-41 Walker Bulldog (light) with 
76mm gun 

Scorpion (light) with 76mm gun . 

Type 59 

Armored personnel carriers 

M-113A1 (amphibious) 

LVTP-7 amphibious assault 

vehicle 

V-150 Commando 

Shortland Mk3 reconnaissance 

vehicle 

Saracen 

Howitzers and guns 

M-101A1 105mm, towed 

Ml 14 155mm, towed 

M-198 155mm, towed 

155mm, towed 

85mm antitank gun 

105mm Kittikhachorn multiple 
rocket launcher 

Mortars 

81mm 

60mm 

Recoilless rifles 

57mm 

75mm 

106mm 

Antiaircraft guns 

40mm 

20mm Vulcan 

Missiles 

BGM-71 A TOW antitank 

missile 

FGM-77A Dragon antitank 

missile 

M-72 self-contained, disposable, 

antitank missile launcher 

Redeye 

Blowpipe surface-to-air missile . . 



United States 

-do- 
Britain 
China 



United States 

-do- 
-do- 

Britain 
-do- 



United States 
-do- 
-do- 
Israel 
China 

Thailand 



United States 
-do- 



-do- 
-do- 
-do- 



-do- 
-do- 



-do- 

-do- 

-do- 
-do- 
Britain 



65 

200 
154 
n.a. 



300 



40 
114 



300 
56 
62 
24 



550 
900 



360 
200 
150 



40 
48 



215 

500 

n.a. 

40 
n.a. 



306 



Table 17. — Continued 



Appendix 



Type and Country In 

Description of Origin Inventory 



Aircraft 





-do- 


90 


Bell UH-1B/D helicopter 


-do- 


90 


Boeing-Vertol CH-47 Chinook helicopter . . . 


United States 


4 


Bell OH- 13 Sioux helicopter 


-do- 


24 


Fairchild FH- 11 00 helicopter 


-do- 


16 


Bell 206 helicopter 


-do- 


3 


Bell 212 helicopter 


-do- 


2 


Bell 214B helicopter 


-do- 


2 


Fairchild OH-23F helicopter 


-do- 


6 


Beech BE-99 light transport 


-do- 


1 




-do- 


28 


Short 330-UTT transport 


Britain 


n.a. 



n.a. — not available. 



Source: Based on information from International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military 
Balance, 1986-1987, London, 1986; and Far Eastern Economic Review Asia Yearbook, 
Hong Kong, 1987. 



307 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Table 18. Major Navy Equipment, 1987 



Type and 
Description 



Country 
of Origin 



In 

Inventory 



Frigates 

Yarrow class; 1,650 tons displacement; 
armed with two 4.5-inch deck guns, two 
40mm Bofors antiaircraft guns, Sea Cat 
surface-to-surface missiles, one antisubma- 
rine Lombo mortar, and two depth charge 
projectors; serves as flagship of Royal 

Fleet Britain 

PF-103 class, 900 tons displacement; armed 
with two 3-inch deck guns, two 40mm anti- 
aircraft guns, Hedgehog antisubmarine 

launchers, and six torpedo tubes United States 

Cannon class; 1,240 tons displacement; 
armed with three 3-inch deck guns, six 
40mm antiaircraft guns, six torpedo tubes, 
and eight depth-charge projectors; ex-USS 
Hemminger 

Tacoma class; 1,430 tons displacement; armed 
with three 3-inch deck guns, two 40mm and 
nine 20mm antiaircraft guns, eight depth- 
charge projectors, and six torpedo tubes; ex- 
USS Glendale and ex-USS Gallup 

Tacoma MK-16 class; 1,430 tons displacement; 
armed with 76mm main guns, 40mm anti- 
aircraft gun, Stingray torpedoes, Harpoon 

and Albatross surface-to-air missiles United States 



-do- 



-do- 



Fast attack craft (missile) 

Breda BMB 30 design; 235 tons displacement; 
armed with four Exocet surface-to-surface 
missiles, one 76mm deck gun, and one 

40mm Bofors antiaircraft gun Italy 

Sea Hawk class; 224 tons displacement; armed 
with five Gabriel missile launchers, one 
57mm Bofors and one 40mm Bofors anti- 
aircraft guns . Singapore 



Large patrol craft 

Trad class; 318 tons displacement; armed with 
two 3 -inch deck guns, one 40mm and two 
20mm antiaircraft guns, and four torpedo 

tubes Italy 

Liulom class (former United States PC 
class); 280 tons displacement; armed with 
one 3-inch deck gun and two torpedo 

tubes United States 

Klongyai class; 110 tons displacement; armed 
with one 3-inch deck gun, one 20mm anti- 
aircraft gun, and two torpedo tubes Thailand 

PGM 71 class; 130 tons displacement; armed 
with one 40mm and four 20mm antiaircraft 
guns and two .50 caliber machine guns; 

former United States vessels United States 



10 



308 



Appendix 



Table 18. — Continued 



Type and 
Description 



Country 
of Oriein 



In 

Inventory 



Cape class (former United States Coast 
Guard cutters); 95 tons displacement; 
armed with one 20mm antiaircraft gun, 
depth charges, and two Hedgehog anti- 
submarine launchers 

Coastal patrol craft 

Small craft; 87.5 tons displacement; armed 
with one 40mm and one 20mm antiaircraft 
gun 

Swift class; 20 tons displacement; armed with 
two 81mm mortars and two .50 caliber 
machine guns; transferred from United States 
Navy to Royal Thai Navy 

River patrol craft 

PBR type; 10.4 tons displacement; armed with 
two .50 caliber and two .30 caliber machine 
guns; former United States vessels 

Fiberglass trimaran 

Mine warfare vessels 

Bangrachan-class coastal minelayer; 368 tons 
displacement; armed with two 3-inch deck 
guns, two 20mm antiaircraft guns, and 142 
mines 

Bluebird-class coastal minesweeper; 330 tons 
displacement; armed with two 20mm anti- 
aircraft guns 

Riverine minesweeper; armed with 20mm deck 
guns, one 12.7mm machine gun, and two 
40mm grenade launchers 

Mine-warfare support ship 

Amphibious vessels 

Landing ship, tank (LST) 

Landing ship, medium (LSM) 

Landing craft, medium/mechanized (LCM) . . 

Landing craft, utility (LCU) 

Landing craft, vehicle and personnel 

Landing craft, assault (LCA) 

Aircraft 

Grumman S-2F Tracker for antisubmarine 
search and attack 

Grumman HU-16B Albatross 

Bell UH-N for antisubmarine search and 
attack 

Canadair CK-215 multipurpose amphibian 
for search and rescue 

F-27 Maritime 

Nomad 



-do- 



Thailand 



United States 



-do- 
Thailand 



Italy 



United States 



Thailand 
Japan 



United States 
-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
Thailand 



United States 
-do- 

-do- 

Canada 
Netherlands 
Australia 



12 



5 
3 
26 
6 
8 

n.a. 



309 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Table 18. — Continued 



Type and 
Description 



Country 
of Origin 



In 

Inventory 



Missiles 

Short Seacat surface-to-air missile Britain 12 

IAI Gabriel-2 surface-to-surface missile Israel 15 

Aerospatiale MM-38 Exocet surface-to-surface 

missile France 12 

n.a. — not available. 

Source: Based on information from International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Mili- 
tary Balance, 1986-1987, New York, 1986; and Far Eastern Economic Review, Asia 
Yearbook 1987, Hong Kong, 1987. 



310 



Appendix 



Table 19. Major Air Force Equipment, 1987 



Type and 
Description 



Country 
of Origin 



In 

Inventory 



Fighter-bombers 

Northrop F-5A/B Freedom Fighter 

Northrop F-5E Tiger II 

Northrop F-5F Tiger II two-seat fighter- 
trainer 

F-16A fighter 

F-16B two-seat fighter-trainer 

Counterinsurgency aircraft 

North American-Rockwell T-28D 

North American-Rockwell OV-10C Bronco 

Cessna A-37B 

Fairchild AU-23A Peacemaker 

Armed reconnaissance aircraft 

Northrop RF-5A Freedom Fighter 

Lockheed T-33A 

Lockheed RT-33A 

Transports and utility aircraft 

McDonnell Douglas C-47 Dakota 

Fairchild C-123B/K Provider 

McDonnell Douglas AC-47 Dakota 

Cessna O-l . . . 

Swearingen Merlin IVA turboprop 

Lockheed C-130H Hercules 

Hawker- Siddeley HS-748 

Britten-Norman Islander 

Fairchild/Pilatus Turbo-Porter 

Lipnur/CASA C-212 Aviocar 

McDonnell Douglas DC-8 

Boeing 737 

Helicopters 

Bell UH-1H Iroquois 

CH-34 

Trainers 

de Havilland DHC-1 Chipmunk 

Cessna T-37B primary jet trainer 

Cessna T-41D Mescalero light utility 

SIAI-Marchetti SF-260MT single piston 

engine 

AESL CT-4 



United States 
-do- 

-do- 
-do- 
-do- 



-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
-do- 



-do- 
-do- 
-do- 



-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
-do- 
Britain 
-do- 
Britain and 
Switzerland 
Indonesia 
and Spain 
United States 
-do- 



-do- 
-do- 



Britain 

United States 
-do- 
Italy 

New Zealand 



13 
34 

4 
8 
4 



20 
24 
14 

25 



15 
30 
10 
35 
3 
4 
2 
1 
10 



20 
11 



Missiles 

NWC AIM-9J Sidewinder air-to-air missile 



United States 



96 



Source: Based on information from International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Mili- 
tary Balance 1986-1987, London, 1986; and Far Eastern Economic Review, Asia 
Yearbook, 1987, Hong Kong, 1987. 



311 



Bibliography 



Chapter 1 

Akin, Rabibhadana. The Organization of Thai Society in the Early 
Bangkok Period, 1782-1873. (Southeast Asia Program, Data Paper, 
No. 74.) Ithaca: Department of Asian Studies, Cornell Univer- 
sity, 1969. 

Allen, Richard. A Short Introduction to the History and Politics of Southeast 

Asia. New York: Oxford University Press, 1970. 
Alsop, Joseph. "Rewriting Human History," Washington Post, Sep- 
tember 8, 1975, A26. 
Asian Development Bank. Southeast Asia's Economy in the 1970s. New 

York: Praeger, 1971. 
Bastin, John, and Harry J. Benda. A History of Modern Southeast Asia: 

Colonialism, Nationalism, and Decolonization. Englewood Cliffs, New 

Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1968. 
Batson, Benjamin A. (ed.). Siam's Political Future: Documents from 

the End of the Absolute Monarchy. (Southeast Asia Program, Data 

Paper, No. 96.) Ithaca: Department of Asian Studies, Cornell 

University, 1974. 
Benda, Harry J., and John Larkin, with Sidney L. Mayer. The 

World of Southeast Asia: Selected Historical Readings. New York: 

Harper and Row, 1967. 
Benedict, Ruth F. Thai Culture and Behavior. (Southeast Asia Pro- 
gram, Data Paper, No. 4.) Ithaca: Department of Asian Studies, 

Cornell University, 1952. 
Berrigan, Darrell. "Thailand: New Cast, Same Play," Reporter, 

No. 17, November 28, 1957, 12-14. 
"Thailand: Phibun Tries Prachathipatai," Reporter, 

No. 14, June 14, 1956, 30-34. 
Bowie, Theodore (ed.). The Arts of Thailand. Bloomington: Indiana 

University Press, 1960. 
Bowring, John. The Kingdom and the People ofSiam. (2 Vols.) London: 

John W. Parker, 1857. 
Briggs, Lawrence P. "The Appearance and Historical Usage of 

the Terms Tai, Thai, Siamese, and Lao,' ' Journal of the American 

Oriental Society, 69, April-June 1949, 60-73. 
Bruce, Helen. Nine Temples of Bangkok. Bangkok: Progress Books, 

1960. 

Buchanan, Keith. The Southeast Asian World: An Introductory Essay. 
Garden City, New York: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1968. 



313 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Bunnag, Tej. The Provincial Administration of Siam, 1892-1915: The 
Ministry of Interior under Prince Ranajubhab. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford 
University Press, 1977. 

Cadet, J. M. The Ramakien: The Thai Epic. Tokyo: Kodansha Inter- 
national, 1970. 

Cady, John F. Southeast Asia: Its Historical Development. New York: 
McGraw-Hill, 1964. 

Chandran Mohandas Jeshurun. The Contest for Siam 1889-1902: 
A Study in Diplomatic Rivalry. Kuala Lumpur: Penerbit Univer- 
sity Kebangsaan Malaysia, 1977. 

Charnvit Kasetsiri. The Rise of Ayudhya: A History of Siam in the Four- 
teenth and Fifteenth Centuries. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University 
Press, 1976. 

Chatthip Nartsupha, and Suthy Prasartset (eds.). Socio- Economic 

Institutions and Cultural Change in Siam, 1851-1910: A Documentary 

Survey. (Southeast Asian Perspectives Series, No. 4.) Singapore: 

Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1977. 
Chula Chakrabongse. Lords of Life: The Paternal Monarchy of Bangkok, 

1782-1932. New York: Taplinger, 1960. 
Coedes, Georges. The Indianized States of Southeast Asia. Honolulu: 

East- West Center Press, 1968. 
The Making of South East Asia. Berkeley and Los Angeles: 

University of California Press, 1969. 
Conze, Edward. The Buddhist Wisdom Books. London: Allen and 

Unwin, 1958. 

Crozier, Brian. South- East Asia in Turmoil. Harmondsworth, Middle- 
sex, United Kingdom: Penguin, 1968. 

Darling, Frank C. "Marshal Sarit and Absolutist Rule in 
Thailand," Pacific Affairs [Vancouver], 33, December 1960, 
347-60. 

"Modern Politics in Thailand," Review of Politics, 24, April 

1962, 163-82. 

. Thailand and the United States. Washington: Public Affairs 

Press, 1965. 

. "Thailand in 1977: The Search for Stability and Prog- 
ress," Asian Survey, 18, No. 2, February 1978, 153-63. 

Dhani Nivat. "The Old Siamese Conception of the Monarchy," 
Journal of the Siam Society [Bangkok], 36, 1947, 91-106. 

Direk, Jayanama. Siam and World War II. Bangkok: Social Science 
Association of Thailand Press, n.d. 

Donner, Wolf. The Five Faces of Thailand: An Economic Geography. 
(Institute of Asian Affairs, Hamburg.) New York: St. Martin's 
Press, 1978. 



314 



Bibliography 



Engel, David M. Law and Kingship in Thailand During the Reign of 

King Chulalongkorn. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Center 

for South and Southeast Asian Studies, 1975. 
Fifield, Russell H. The Diplomacy of Southeast Asia: 1945-1958. New 

York: Harper and Row, 1958. 
Frederic, Louis. The Art of Southeast Asia: Temples and Sculpture. New 

York: Abrams, 1965. 
Girling, John L.S. Thailand: Society and Politics. Ithaca: Cornell 

University Press, 1981. 
Graham, Walter A. Siam. (2 Vols, 2d ed.) London: Alexander 

Moring, 1924. 

Hall, D.G.E. A History of South-East Asia. (2d ed.) London: 
Macmillan, 1964. 

Hanks, Lucien M. "Merit and Power in the Thai Social Order," 
American Anthropologist, 64, No. 6, December 1962, 1247-61. 

Hearn, Robert (ed.). A Guide to Research Materials on Thailand and 
Laos. Auburn, New York: Asia Library Services, 1977. 

Heine-Geldern, Robert G. Conceptions of State and Kingship in Southeast 
Asia. (Southeast Asia Program, Data Paper, No. 18.) Ithaca: 
Department of Asian Studies, Cornell University, 1956. 

Higham, Charles, and Amphan Kijngam. "Ban-Chiang and 
Northeast Thailand — Palaeoenvironment and Economy, "Journal 
of Archaelogical Science, 6, No. 3, September 1979, 211-34. 

Ho Kwon Ping. "Thailand's Broken Ricebowl," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 102, No. 48, December 1, 1978, 
40-46. 

Ingram, James C. Economic Change in Thailand, 1850-1970. Stanford: 

Stanford University Press, 1971. 
Insor, D. Thailand: A Political, Social, and Economic Analysis. New 

York: Praeger, 1963. 
Ishii, Yoneo (ed.). Thailand: A Rice-Growing Society. (Monographs 

of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University.) 

Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1978. 
Jones, Robert R. Thai Titles and Ranks: Including a Translation of 

Traditions of Royal Lineage in Siam by King Chulalongkorn. (Southeast 

Asia Program, Data Paper, No. 81 .) Ithaca: Department of Asian 

Studies, Cornell University, 1971. 
Keyes, Charles F. Thailand: Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State. 

Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1987. 
Kirk, Donald. Wider War: The Struggle for Cambodia, Thailand, and 

Laos. New York: Praeger, 1971. 
Kunstadter, Peter (ed.). Southeast Asian Tribes, Minorities, and Nations. 

(2 Vols.) Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967. 



315 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Lebar, Frank M., et al. Ethnic Groups of Mainland Southeast Asia. 
New Haven, Connecticut: Human Relations Area Files Press, 
1964. 

Lent, John A. (ed.). The Asian Newspapers 1 Reluctant Revolution. Ames: 

Iowa State University Press, 1971. 
Lester, Robert C. Theravada Buddhism in Southeast Asia. Ann Arbor: 

University of Michigan Press, 1973. 
McAlister, John T. (ed.). Southeast Asia: The Politics of National Inte- 
gration. New York: Random House, 1973. 
Malalasekera, G.P. "Theravada Buddhism." Pages 161-94 in 

Ismail R. al Faruqi (ed.), Historical Atlas of the Religions of the World. 

New York: Macmillan, 1974. 
Martin, James V., Jr. "Thai- American Relations in World War 

II," Journal of Asian Studies, 22, No. 4, August 1963, 451-67. 
Mills, Lennox A. Southeast Asia: Illusion and Reality in Politics and 

Economics. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1964. 
Moffat, Abbot Low. Mongkut: The King of Siam. Ithaca: Cornell 

University Press, 1961. 
Morrison, Charles E., and Astri Suhrke. Strategies of Survival: The 

Foreign Policy Dilemmas of Smaller Asian States. New York: St. 

Martin's Press, 1979. 
Moseley, George V.H. The Consolidation of the South China Frontier. 

(Center for Chinese Studies, University of California.) Berkeley 

and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1973. 
Murti, T.R.V. The Central Philosophy of Buddhism. London: Allen 

and Unwin, 1955. 
Niksch, Larry A. "Thailand in 1981: the Prem Government Feels 

the Heat," Asian Survey, 22, No. 2, February 1982, 191-99. 
Panikkar, K.M. Asia and Western Dominance. New York: Collier 

Books, 1969. 

Peterson, Alec. "Britain and Siam: The Latest Phase," Pacific 
Affairs [Vancouver], 19, December 1946, 364-72. 

Punyaratabandhu-Bhakdi, Suchitra. "Thailand in 1982: General 
Arthit Takes Center Stage." Asian Survey, 23, No. 2, February 
1983, 172-77. 

"Thailand in 1983: Democracy, Thai Style." Asian Survey, 

24, No. 2, February 1984, 187-94. 
Ramsay, Ansil. "Thailand 1978: Kriangsak — the Thai Who 

Binds." Asian Survey, 19, No. 2, February 1979, 104-14. 
Rawson, Phillip. The Art of Southeast Asia. London: Thames and 

Hudson, 1967. 

Riggs, Fred W. Thailand: The Modernization of a Bureaucratic Polity. 
Honolulu: East-West Center Press, 1966. 



316 



Bibliography 



Robinson, Warren C. "Economic Policy and Population Change 
in Thailand," World Development [Oxford], 6, Nos. 11-12, 1978, 
1261-69. 

Salmony, Alfred. Sculpture in Siam. New York: Harker Art Books, 
1972. 

Sarasin, Viraphol. Sino-Siamese Trade, 1652-1853. Cambridge: 
Harvard University Press, 1977. 

Seidenfaden, Eric. The Thai Peoples, I: The Origins and Habitats of 
the Thai Peoples with a Sketch of Their Material and Spiritual Culture. 
Bangkok: Siam Society, 1958. 

Shaplen, Robert. Time Out of Hand: Revolution and Reaction in Southeast 
Asia. New York: Harper and Row, 1969. 

Sharp, Lauriston, and Lucien M. Hanks. Bang Chan: Social His- 
tory of a Rural Community in Thailand. Ithaca: Cornell University 
Press, 1978. 

Siffin, William J. The Thai Bureaucracy: Institutional Change and 

Development. Honolulu: East- West Center Press, 1966. 
Silpa, Bhirasri. Thai Architecture and Painting. (4th ed.). Bangkok: 

National Culture Institute, 1956. 
Skinner, George William. Chinese Society in Thailand: An Analytical 

History. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1957. 
Skinner, George William, and A. Thomas Kirsch (eds.). Change 

and Persistence in Thai Society: Essays in Honor of Lauriston Sharp. 

Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975. 
Smith, Bardwell L. (ed.). Religion and Legitimation of Power in 

Thailand, Laos, and Burma. (South and Southeast Asia Studies.) 

Chambersburg, Pennsylvania: Anima Books, 1978. 
Smith, Harold E. Historical and Cultural Dictionary of Thailand. 

(Historical and Cultural Dictionaries of Asia, No. 6.) Metuchen, 

New Jersey: Scarecrow Press, 1976. 
Solheim, Wilhelm G. "New Light on a Forgotten Past," National 

Geographic Magazine, 139, No. 3, March 1971, 330-39. 
Steinberg, David Joel (ed.). In Search of Southeast Asia: A Modern 

History. New York: Praeger, 1971. 
Tarling, Nicholas. A Concise History of Southeast Asia. New York: 

Praeger, 1966. 

Textor, Robert B. "Cultural Futures for Thailand: An Ethno- 
graphic Enquiry," Futures, 10, October 1978, 347-60. 

Thak Chaloemtiarana. "Reflections on the Sarit Regime and the 
Process of Political Change in Thailand: Some Conceptual and 
Theoretical Reassessments," Southeast Asian Studies, 16, No. 3, 
December 1978, 400-10. 

Thamsook Numnonda. Thailand and the Japanese Presence, 1941-45. 
(Research Notes and Discussions Series, No. 6.) Singapore: 
Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, October 1977. 



317 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Thompson, Virginia. "Government Instability in Siam," Far 

Eastern Survey, 27, 1948, 185-89. 
Trumbull, Robert. The Scrutable East: A Correspondent's Report on 

Southeast Asia. New York: David McKay, 1964. 
Van Roy, Edward. Economic Systems of Northern Thailand: Structure 

and Change. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1971. 
Vella, Walter F. Chaiyo: King Vajiravudh and the Development of Thai 

Nationalism. Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1978. 
The Impact of the West on Government in Thailand. (Univer- 
sity of California Publications in Political Science, 4, No. 3.) 

Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1955. 
Siam under Rama III, 1824-1851. (Monographs of the 

Association for Asian Studies, No. 4.) Locust Valley, New York: 

Augustin, 1957. 

Von Der Mehden, Fred R. South- East Asia 1930-1970: The Legacy 

of Colonialism and Nationalism. New York: Norton, 1974. 
Wales, Horace Geoffrey Quaritch. Ancient Siamese Government and 

Administration. London: Bernard Quaritch, 1934. 

. Siamese State Ceremonies. London: Bernard Quaritch, 1931. 

Warren, William. "Out of Thai Soil an Archeological Upheaval," 

ASIA, 4, No. 3, September-October 1981, 26-28, 52-54. 
Wenk, Klaus. The Restoration of Thailand under Rama I, 1782-1809. 

(Association for Asian Studies Monographs and Papers, No. 24.) 

Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1968. 
Werner, Jayne, et al. "October 1976: The Coup in Thailand," 

Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 9, No. 3, July- September 1977, 

2-51. 

Wilson, David A. "The Military in Thai Politics." Pages 326-39 
in Robert O. Tilman (ed.), Man, State, and Society in Contemporary 
Southeast Asia. New York: Praeger, 1969. 

Politics in Thailand. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1962. 

. "Thailand." Pages 3-72 in George McTurnan Kahin 

(ed.), Governments and Politics in Southeast Asia. (2ded., Southeast 
Asia Program, Cornell University.) Ithaca: Cornell University 
Press, 1964. 

Wyatt, David K. The Politics of Reform in Thailand: Education in 
the Reign of King Chulalongkorn. (Yale Southeast Asia Studies, 
Cultural Report Series, No. 4.) New Haven: Yale Univesity 
Press, 1969. 

Thailand: A Short History. New Haven: Yale University 

Press, 1984. 

Young, Gordon. The Hill Tribes of Northern Thailand. New York: 
AMS Press, 1982. 



318 



Bibliography 



(Various issues of the following periodicals were also used in the 
preparation of this chapter: Asian Survey, Asiaweek [Hong Kong]; 
Bangkok Post [Bangkok] ; and Far Eastern Economic Review Asia Year 
Book.) 

Chapter 2 

Amnesty International. "Health Concern, Thailand: Damri 
Reaungsutham, Aged 62." (ASA 39/04/85.) London: Decem- 
ber 1985, 1-2. 

. "Lao People's Democratic Republic: Arrests Following 

Forcible Repatriation." (ASA 26/01/87.) London: April 10, 
1987, 1-2. 

Anderson, Ben. "Withdrawal Symptoms: Social and Cultural 
Aspects of the October 6 Coup," Bulletin of Concerned Asian Schol- 
ars, 9, No. 3, July-September 1977, 13-30. 

"Another Victory," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 13, No. 15, April 27, 
1987, 25. 

Aran Suwanbubpa, and Amnoyvit Schoovong. "An Investigation 
into the Etiology of Heroin Addiction Among Narcotic Prison- 
ers. " Journal of the National Research Council [Bangkok] ,11, No. 1 , 
January-June 1979, 39-45. 

Arnold, Fred, Robert D. Retherford, and Anuri Wanglee. "The 
Demographic Situation in Thailand." (Papers of the East- West 
Population Institute, Vol. 45.) Honolulu: East-West Center, July 
1977. 

Arong Suthasana. "The Impact of Modern Development in South- 
east Asia: A Thai Case." Pages 54-61 in International Seminar 
on Islam in Southeast Asia. Jakarta: Lembaga Penelitian Iain Syarif 
Hidayatullah, 1986. 

Ayal, Eliezer B. (ed.). The Study of Thailand: Analyses of Knowledge, 
Approaches, and Prospects in Anthropology, Art History, Economics, His- 
tory, and Political Science. (Southeast Asia Program, Southeast Asia 
Series, No. 54.) Athens: Ohio University Center for Interna- 
tional Studies, 1978. 

Boonsanong Panyodyana. "Chinese-Thai Differential Assimila- 
tion in Bangkok: An Exploratory Study," (Southeast Asia Pro- 
gram, Data Paper, No. 79.) Ithaca: Department of Asian Studies, 
Cornell University, 1971. 

Botan. Chotmai Chak Muang Thai (Letters from Thailand.) Bangkok: 
D.K. Book House, 1977. 

Brummelhuis, Han ten, and Jeremy H. Kemp (eds.). Strategies and 
Structures in Thai Society. Amsterdam: Universiteit van Amsterdam, 
Antropologisch-Sociolgisch Centrum, 1984. 



319 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Bunnag, Jane. Buddhist Monk, Buddhist Layman: A Study of Urban, 
Monastic Organization in Central Thailand. Cambridge: Cambridge 
University Press, 1973. 

Buri Rangsan. Patiwat Prachathipatai (Revolutionary Democracy). 
Nonthaburi, Thailand: Samnakphim Santhitham, 1985. 

Burrows, Rob. "Thailand: Closing KhaoT-Dang, " Refugees [Geneva], 
No. 40, April 1987, 9-11. 

Chase, Susan. "AID in Thailand," Front Lines, 26, No. 11, Novem- 
ber 1986, 7-10. 

Cheang, Wee Soo. "How Thailand's Deaf Made Themselves 
Heard," Nation [Bangkok], December 16, 1984, 19. 

Chetana Nagavajara. Thang Bisu Watthanatham Haeng Kanwichan 
(Towards Literary Criticism). Bangkok: Borisat Samnakphim 
Duang Komon Chamkat, 1981. 

"Thai Literary Historiography: From Self- Assertion 

Through Self-Criticism Towards Self- Knowledge." (Unpub- 
lished paper for the Southeast Asian Summer Institute Confer- 
ence held at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, n.d.) 

Chote Suvatti. "Chao Thai Lae Chon Tangpao Nai Mu'ang Thai" 
(Thai and Its Relatives in Thailand). Journal of the National Research 
Council [Bangkok], 8, No. 2, July-December 1976, 1-100. 

Cochrane, Susan H. "The Population of Thailand: Its Growth 
and Welfare." (World Bank Staff Working Paper, No. 337.) 
Washington: World Bank, Development Economic Department, 
Development Policy Staff, June 1979. 

Crossette, Barbara. "Thais Pressing Ouster of Laotians," New York 
Times, March 19, 1987, A14. 

Darunee Tantiwiramanond, and Shashi Pandey. "The Status and 
Role of Thai Women in the Pre-Modern Period: A Historical 
and Cultural Perspective," Sojourn [Singapore], 2, No. 1, Febru- 
ary 1987, 125-49. 

Deyo, Frederic C. "Ethnicity and Work Culture in Thailand: A 
Comparison of Thai and Thai-Chinese White-Collar Workers," 
Journal of Asian Studies, 34, No. 4, August 1975, 995-1015. 

Donner, Wolf. The Five Faces of Thailand: An Economic Geography. 
(The Institute of Asian Affairs, Hamburg), New York: St. 
Martin's Press, 1978. 

Embree, John F. "Thailand — A Loosely Structured Social Sys- 
tem," American Anthropologist, 52, 1950, 181-93. 

Evers, Hans-Dieter, and T.H. Silcock. "Elites and Selection." 
Pages 84-104 in T.H. Silcock (ed.), Thailand: Social and Economic 
Studies in Development. Durham, North Carolina: Duke Univer- 
sity Press, 1967. 



320 



Bibliography 



Evers, Hans-Dieter (ed.). Loosely Structured Social Systems: Thailand 
in Comparative Perspective. (Southeast Asia Studies. Cultural Report 
Series, No. 17.) New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969. 

Flood, E. Thadeus. "The Vietnamese Refugees in Thailand: 
Minority Manipulation in Counterinsurgency," Bulletin of Con- 
cerned Asian Scholars, 9, No. 3, July-September 1971, 31-47. 

Foster, Brian L. Commerce and Ethnic Differences: The Case of the Mon 
in Thailand. (Southeast Asia Program, Papers in International 
Studies Series, No. 59.) Athens, Ohio: Center for International 
Studies, 1982. 

"Friendship in Rural Thailand," Ethnology. 15, No. 3. 

July 1976, 251-67. 

. Social Organization of Four Mon and Thai Villages. New Haven, 

Connecticut: Human Relations Area Files Press, 1977. 

Geddes, William Robert. Migrants of the Mountains: The Cultural Ecol- 
ogy of the Blue Miao (Hmong Njua) of Thailand. New York: Oxford 
University Press, 1976. 

Girling, John L.S. Thailand: Society and Politics. Ithaca: Cornell 
University Press, 1981. 

Grace, Brewster. A Note on Thailand: The Student Rebellion and Polit- 
ical Change. (American Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. 
Southeast Asia Series, 22, No. 4.) Hanover, New Hampshire: 
AUFS, 1974. 

. The Politics of Income Distribution in Thailand. (American 

Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. Southeast Asia Series, 
25, No. 7.) Hanover, New Hampshire: AUFS, 1977. 

Population Growth in Thailand Part I: Population and Social 

Structure. (American Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. 
Southeast Asia Series, 22, No. 1.) Hanover, New Hampshire: 
AUFS, 1974. 

. Population Growth in Thailand Part II: Population and Employ- 
ment. (American Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. 
Southeast Asia Series, 22, No. 2.) Hanover, New Hampshire: 
AUFS, 1974. 

. Recent Developments in Thai Rice Production. (American 

Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. Southeast Asia Series, 
23, No. 3.) Hanover, New Hampshire: AUFS, 1975. 

Griswold, A.B., and Prasert na Nagara. "The Inscription of King 
Rama Gamhen of Sukodaya (1292 A.D.)" Journal of the Siam 
Society [Bangkok], 59, No. 2, July 1971, 179-228. 

Gua, Bo. "Opium, Bombs and Trees: The Future of the H'mong 
Tribesmen in Northern Thailand," Journal of Contemporary Asia 
[London], 5, No. 1, 1975, 70-81. 



321 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Hanks, Lucien M. Rice and Man: Agricultural Ecology in Southeast Asia. 

Chicago: Aldine Atherton, 1972. 
Hearn, Robert M. Thai Government Programs in Refugee Relocation and 

Resettlement in Northern Thailand. Auburn, New York: Thailand 

Books, 1974. 

Heine-Geldern, Robert G. Conceptions of State and Kingship in Southeast 
Asia. (Southeast Asia Program, Data Paper, No. 18.) Ithaca: 
Cornell University, 1956. 

Hiebert, Murray. "Laos: Flexible Policies Spark Tenuous Recov- 
ery," Indochina Issues, No. 37, May 1983, 1-7. 

"Hok Sinlapin Thai Nai Amerika" (Six Thai Artists in America). 
Sayamrat Sapda Wichan [Bangkok], 33, No. 4, July 1986, 34-7. 

Hussain, Zakir. The Silent Minority: Indians in Thailand. Bangkok: 
Social Research Institute, Chulalongkorn University, 1982. 

Ibrahim Syukri. History of the Malay Kingdom of Patani. (Southeast 
Asian Series, No. 68.) Athens: Ohio University, Center for Inter- 
national Studies, 1985. 

Ingersoll, Jasper. "The Priest Role in Central Village Thailand." 
Pages 51-76 in Manning Nash, et al., Anthropological Studies in 
Theravada Buddhism. New Haven: Southeast Asia Studies, Yale 
University, 1966. 

Ishii, Yoneo. Sangha, State, and Society: Thai Buddhism in History. 
Monographs of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto 
University. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1986. 

Karuna Kusalasaya. Buddhism in Thailand: Its Past and Its Present. 
The Wheel Publication No. 85-86. Kandy, Ceylon: Buddhist 
Publication Society, 1965. 

Keye, Peter. "Tide is Turning Against Pirates," San Diego Union, 
June 15, 1987, Al. 

Keyes, Charles F. Thailand: Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State. 
Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1987. 

"Local Leadership in Rural Thailand." Pages 219-50 in 

Fred R. von der Mehden and David A. Wilson (eds.), Local 
Authority and Administration in Thailand. Los Angeles: University 
of California Academic Advisory Council for Thailand, 1970. 

"Political Crisis and Militant Buddhism in Contemporary 

Thailand." Pages 147-64 in Bardwell L. Smith (ed.), Religion 
and Legitimation of Power in Thailand, Laos, and Burma. Chambers- 
burg, Pennsylvania: Anima Books, 1978. 

Keyes, Charles F. (ed.). Ethnic Adaptation and Identity: The Karen 
on the Thai Frontier with Burma. Philadelphia: Institute for the Study 
of Human Issues, 1979. 

Khrongkan Phak Prachachon Haeng Chat (A Plan for the People's Party). 
Bangkok: Rongphim Ruan Kaeo Kanphim, 1986. 



322 



Bibliography 



Kunstadter, Peter (ed.). Southeast Asian Tribes, Minorities, and Nations. 
(2 Vols.) Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967. 

"Laos Rides a New Line." Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 13, No. 14, 
April 15, 1987, 28-45. 

Le Xuan Khoa. "Shift to Immigration," Bridge, 3, No. 4, Decem- 
ber, 1986, 1, 20. 

Lebar, Frank M., Gerald C. Hickey, and John K. Musgrave. Ethnic 
Groups of Mainland Southeast Asia. New Haven, Connecticut: 
Human Relations Area Files Press, 1964. 

Lewis, Paul, and Elaine Lewis. Peoples of the Golden Triangle: Six 
Tribes in Thailand. London: Thames and Hudson, 1984. 

Lissak, Moshe. Military Roles in Modernization: Civil-Military Rela- 
tions in Thailand and Burma. Beverly Hills, California: Sage Pub- 
lications, 1976. 

Luong Thu Thuy, and Walter E J. Tips. "Women and Develop- 
ment in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam: A Comparison with 
Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines." (Working Paper, 
No. 118.) East Lansing: Michigan State University, 1986. 

Luther, Hans U. "Peasants and State in Contemporary Thailand," 
International Journal of Politics [Hamburg], 8, No. 4, Winter 
1978-79, 1. 

Lutpi Ibrahim (ed.). Islamika: Esei-esei Sempena Abad Ke-15 Hijrah 

(Islam: Blessed Essays for the Fifteenth Century After the Hijah). 

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Sarjana Enterprise, 1981. 
Malalasekera, G.P. "Theravada Buddhism." Pages 161-94 in 

Ismail R. al Faruqi (ed.), Historical Atlas of the Religions of the World. 

New York: Macmillan, 1974. 
Martin, Linda G. (ed.). The ASEAN Success Story: Social, Economic, 

and Political Dimensions. (Based on proceedings of the East-West 

Center Conference on ASEAN and the Pacific Basin, 1985.) 

Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1987. 
Mattani Mojdara Rutin. "The Development of Theatre Studies 

at the University Level," Journal of the National Research Council 

[Bangkok], 14, No. 2, July-December 1982, 1-19. 
McKinnon, John, and Wanat Bhruksasri (eds.). Highlanders of 

Thailand. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Oxford University Press, 

1983. 

Mizuno, Koishi. Social System of Don Daeng Village: A Community Study 
in Northeast Thailand. (Discussion Papers 12-22.) Kyoto: Kyoto 
University, Center for Southeast Asian Studies, 1971. 

Moerman, Michael. Agricultural Change and Peasant Choice in a Thai 
Village. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 
1968. 



323 



Thailand: A Country Study 



. "Ban Ping's Temple: The Center of a 'Loosely- Structured' 

Society." Pages 137-74 in Manning Nash, et al., Anthropological 
Studies in Theravada Buddhism (Southeast Asia Studies, Cultural 
Report Series, No. 13.) New Haven: Yale University Press, 
1966. 

"Ethnic Identification in a Complex Civilization: Who 

are the Lue?" American Anthropologist, 67, No. 5, October 1965, 
1215-30. 

"Kinship and Commerce in a Thai-Lue Village," Ethno- 
logy, 5, No. 4, October 1966, 360-64. 

"A Thai Village Headman as a Synaptic Leader, "Jour- 
nal of Asian Studies, 28, No. 3, May 1969, 535-49. 

Mole, Robert L. Thai Values and Behavior Patterns. Rutiand, Vermont: 
C.E. Tuttle, 1973. 

Mudannayake, Ivan (ed.). Thailand Year Book 1975-76. Bangkok: 
Temple Publicity Services, 1975. 

Murray, Charles A. A Behavioral Study of Rural Modernization: Social 
and Economic Change in Thai Villages. New York: Praeger, 1977. 

Muscat, Robert J. Development Strategy in Thailand. A Study of Eco- 
nomic Growth. New York: Praeger, 1966. 

National Minorities Questions Editorial Panel. Questions and Answers 
About China's Minority Nationalities. Beijing: New World Press, 
1985. 

"Panha Dek Lae Yaowachon Phlae Ruarang Khong Sangkhom" 
(Social Problems of Children and Youth in Bangkok). Sayamrat 
Sapda Wichan [Bangkok], 33, No. 22, November 16-22, 1986, 
23-27. 

Pasuk Phongpaichit. From Peasant Girls to Bangkok Masseuses. 
(Women, Work, and Development Series, No. 2.) Geneva: Inter- 
national Labour Office, 1982. 

Phillips, Herbert P. Modern Thai Literature: With an Ethnographic Inter- 
pretation. Honolulu: University of Hawaii, 1987. 

Thai Peasant Personality: The Patterning of Interpersonal Behavior 

in the Village of Bang Chan. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University 
of California Press, 1966. 

Piker, Steven. "Sources of Stability and Instability in Rural Thai 
Society, ' ' Journal of Asian Studies, 27, No. 4, August 1968, 777-90. 

Poole, Peter A. "The Vietnamese in Thailand: Their Continuing 
Role in Thai- Vietnamese Relationships," South- East Asian Spec- 
trum, 4, No. 2, January-March 1976, 40-43. 

Potter, Jack M. Thai Peasant Social Structure. Chicago: University 
of Chicago Press, 1976. 

Potter, Sulamith Heins. Family Life in a Northern Thai Village. 
Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1977. 



324 



Bibliography 



Proschan, Frank. "Tradition and Survival: Khmu Highlanders 
in America." Pages 87-90 in Thomas Vennam, Jr., 1986 Fes- 
tival of American Folklife. Washington: Smithsonian Institution 
Press, 1986. 

Pryor, R.J. Migration and Development in South- East Asia. New York: 
Oxford University Press, 1979. 

Puey Ungphakorn. Sinlatham Lae Sasana Nai Kanphatthana Chat (Role 
of Ethnics and Religion in National Development). Chiang Mai, 
Thailand: Sapha Kritsatchak nai Prathet Thai, 1969. 

"Rangoon Attacks," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 13, No. 2, Janu- 
ary 11, 1987, 18. 

"Refugee Problem in Thailand, ' ' Thailand Foreign Affairs Newsletter 
[Bangkok], No. 3, March 1986, 11-14. 

"The Rites of Homage to the Teachers," Thai Life [Bangkok], 1, 
No. 2, June 1982, 4-5. 

Ryan, N.J. The Making of Modern Malaysia and Singapore: a History 
From Earliest Times to 1966. (4th ed.), Kuala Lumpur: Oxford 
University Press, 1969. 

Sangharakshita, Bhikshu. The Three Jewels: An Introduction to Bud- 
dhism. London: Rider, 1967. 

Shaplen, Robert. "Letter from Bangkok," New Yorker, July 24, 
1978, 43-57. 

Sharp, Lauriston, et al. Siamese Rice Village: A Preliminary Study of 

Bang Chan, 1948-1949. Bangkok: Cornell Research Center, 1953. 
Skinner, George William. Chinese Society in Thailand: An Analytical 

History. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1957. 
. Leadership and Power in the Chinese Community of Thailand. 

Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1958. 
Skinner, George William, and A. Thomas Kirsch (eds.). Change 

and Persistence in Thai Society: Essays in Honor of Lauriston Sharp. 

Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975. 
"Slaking a Thirst for Success, ' ' Asiaweek [Hong Kong] ,11, No. 16, 

April 19, 1985, 52-53. 
Smith, Bardwell L. (ed.). Religion and Legitimation of Power in 

Thailand, Laos, and Burma. (South and Southeast Asia Studies.) 

Chambersburg, Pennsylvania: Anima Books, 1978. 
Smith, Harold E. Historical and Cultural Dictionary of Thailand. 

(Historical and Cultural Dictionaries of Asia, No. 6.) Metuchen, 

New Jersey: Scarecrow Press, 1976. 
Somboon Suksamran. Political Buddhism in Southeast Asia: The Role 

of the Sangha in the Modernization of Thailand. New York: St. 

Martin's Press, 1976. 
Somkiat Onvimol. Unpublished speech on current Thai foreign 

policy at The Fletcher School for Law and Diplomacy, Tufts 

University. Conference on Thailand, Fall 1982. 



325 



Thailand: A Country Study 

"Somkiat Tops TV News Survey Poll," Nation [Bangkok], Novem- 
ber 30, 1986, 2. 

"Southeast Asian Refugee Arrivals in the U.S. and Third Coun- 
tries: (April 1975 through September 1986)," Bridge, 3, No. 4, 
December 1986, 10. 

Sriprinya Ramakomud. "Theravada Buddhist Value and Economic 
Development." Unpublished paper given at Northern Illinois 
University in November 1982 for a conference "Two Hundred 
Years of the Chakkri Dynasty," 1-7. 

Sternstein, Larry. Thailand: The Environment of Modernization. Sydney: 
McGraw-Hill, 1976. 

Stifel, Lawrence. "Technocrats and Modernization in Thailand," 
Asian Survey, 16, No. 12, December 1976, 1184-96. 

Subhadradis Diskul, M.C. Art in Thailand: A Brief History. Bangkok: 
Amarin Press, 1981. 

Suhrke, Astri. "Loyalists and Separatists: The Muslims in Southern 
Thailand," Asian Survey, 57, No. 3, March 1977, 237-50. 

Surin Pitsuwan. Islam and Malay Nationalism. Bangkok: Thai Khadi 
Research Institute, Thammasat University, 1985. 

Suryadinata, Leo. China and the ASEAN States: The Ethnic Chinese 
Dimension. Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1985. 

Sutthiphon Chiraphan. Landlessness in Central Thailand. Bangkok: 
Division of Research and Planning, Agricultural Land Reform 
Office, Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, 1981. 

Svantesson, Jan-Olaf. Khmu Phonology & Morphology. Malmo, 
Sweden: CWK Gleerup, 1983. 

Swanson, Herbert R. Khrischak Muang Nua: A Study in Northern Thai 
Church History. Bangkok: Chuan Printing Press, 1984. 

Tambiah, S.J. "The Persistence and Transformation of Tradition 
in Southeast Asia, with Special Reference to Thailand, ' ' Daedalus, 
102, No. 1, Winter 1979, 55-84. 

. Buddhism and the Spirit Cults in Northeast Thailand. Cam- 
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970. 

Tapp, N. "Buddhism and Ethnic Minorities: Wat Tarn Krabok," 
Seeds of Peace [Bangkok], 1, No. 2, October 1985, 19-23. 

Textor, Robert B. "Cultural Future for Thailand: An Ethnographic 
Inquiry", Futures, 10, October 1978, 347-60. 

Thailand. Bank of. Thailand: Economic Conditions in 1986 and Out- 
look for 1987: Special Supplement. Bangkok: 1987. 

. Embassy in Washington. Press release on the closing down 

of the KhaoT-Dang Holding Center, December 31, 1986. 

Ministry of Education. Educational Development in Thailand 

(1979-1980): Report to the 38th Session of the International Conference 
on Education, Geneva, November 1981. Bangkok: 1981. 



326 



Bibliography 



. Ministry of Interior. Department of Public Welfare. 

Raingan Pracham Pi 1983 (Annual Report 1983). Bangkok: 1984. 

. Office of the Prime Minister. Government Public Rela- 
tions Department. Foreign News Division. Facets of Thai Cul- 
tural Life. Bangkok: 1984. 

. Office of the Prime Minister. National Statistical Office. 

Statistical Handbook of Thailand 1985. Bangkok: n.d. 

. Office of the Prime Minister. National Statistical Office. 

Statistical Reports Division. Warasan Sathiti Raidaimat (Quarterly 
Bulletin of Statistics) [Bangkok], 32, No. 3, September 1984. 

. - Office of the Prime Minister. National Identity Office. 
Thailand in the 80s. Bangkok, 1984. 

Office of the Prime Minister. Office of the National Eco- 
nomic and Social Development Board. Development Plan For Women 
for the Period of Five Years, 1982-1986. Bangkok: 1981. 

. Office of the Prime Minister. Thailand 1982: Plans, 

Problems, and Prospects. Bangkok: 1982. 

Thailand's Policy Toward the Vietnam- Kampuchea Conflict. Bangkok: 
Chujalongkorn University, Institute of Asian Studies, 1985. 

Turton\ Andrew. "National Minority Peoples in Indochina, "Jour- 
nal offContemporary Asia [London], 4, No. 3, 1974, 332-46. 

. "Northern Thai Peasant Society: Twentieth Century 

Transformation in Political and Social Structures," Journal of 
Peasant Studies, 3, No. 3, April 1976, 267-98. 

United Nations. Department of International Economic and Social 
Affairs and Fund for Population Activities. Population Policy Com- 
pendium. Thailand, n. pi: January 1979. 

United Nations. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and 
the Pacific. The Population of Thailand. (Country Monograph 
Series, No. 3.) Bangkok: 1976. 

. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific. 

"Thailand." Pages 572-92 in Statistical Yearbook for Asia and the 
Pacific, 1983, Bangkok, 1984. 

United States. Congress. 96th, 1st Session. Senate. Committee on 
the Judiciary. Refugee Crisis in Southeast Asia. Results of the Geneva 
Conference. Washington: GPO, July 26, 1979. 

. Department of Commerce. Bureau of the Census. Coun- 
try Demographic Profiles: Thailand. (ISP DP 15.) Washington: GPO, 
April 1978. 

Department of State. ' 'Refugees," Department of State Bulle- 
tin: The Official Monthly Record of United States Foreign Policy, 79, 
No. 2031, October 1979, 1-8. 

Vajiranana Varoros. Autobiography: the Life of Prince- Patriarch Vajiranana 
ofSiam, 1860-1921. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1979. 



327 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Valaiporn Bhavabhutanonda. "Botbat Khong Phrasong Thai Thi 
Ben Mo Phra Nai Dan Kanbambat Raksa Rok Kae Chumnum- 
chon" (The Medical Role of the 'Doctor Bhikku' in Bangkok 
and Rural Communities), Journal of the National Research Council 
[Bangkok], 12, No. 2, July-December 1980, 11-60. 

Wain, Barry. The Refused: The Agony of the Indochina Refugees . New 
York: Simon and Schuster, 1981. 

Wenk, Klaus. Restoration of Thailand Under Rama I, 1782-1809. 
(Association for Asian Studies Monographs and Papers, No. 24.) 
Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1968. 

Wibha Senanan. The Genesis of the Novel in Thailand. Bangkok: Thai 
Watana Panich, 1975. 

World Bank. World Development Report, 1979. Washington: 1979. 

Wyatt, David K. The Politics of Reform in Thailand: Education in the 
Reign of King Chulalongkorn. (Southeast Asia Studies, Cultural 
Report Series, No. 4.) New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969. 

Thailand: A Short History. New Haven: Yale University 

Press, 1984. 

Chapter 3 

"The Baht Devaluation: The Final Panacea to Thailand's Eco- 
nomic Ills?" Business Review [Bangkok], No. 13, November 1984, 
32-34. 

Baldwin, W. Lee, and W. David Maxwell (eds.). The Role of For- 
eign Financial Assistance to Thailand in the 1980s. Lexington, 
Massachusetts: Lexington Books, D.C. Heath, 1975. 

Berkoff, D.J.W. "Land and Development in South Thailand," 
South- East Asian Spectrum [Bangkok], 4, No. 2, January -March 
1976, 44-55. 

Blanchard, Wendell, et al. Thailand: Its People, Its Society, Its Cul- 
ture, New Haven, Connecticut: Human Relations Area Files 
Press, 1957. 

Brannon, Russell H. The Agricultural Sector in Thailand: A Brief 
Assessment (Staff Paper, No. 66.) Lexington: Department of 
Agricultural Economics, University of Kentucky College of 
Agriculture, April 1978. 

Caldwell, J. Alexander. A merican Economic A id to Thailand. Lexing- 
ton, Massachusetts: Lexington Books, D.C. Heath, 1974. 

Chamlong Attanatho, and Suthiporn Chirapanda. "Current Land 
Reform in Thailand, 1977." Pages 183-92 in Vichitvong Na 
Pombhejara (ed.), Readings in Thailand's Political Economy. 
Bangkok: Bangkok Printing Enterprise, May 1978. 



328 



Bibliography 



Connell, John. "Thailand's Southern Land Settlement Schemes," 
Asian Profile [Hong Kong], 6, No. 6, December 1978, 577-55. 

Cooper, Robert. Resource Scarcity and the Hmong Response: Patterns 
of Settlement and Economy in Transition. Singapore: Singapore 
University Press, National University of Singapore, 1984. 

"A Critique of the New Government's Economic Policy," Bangkok 
Bank Monthly Review, No. 24, June 1983, 253-62. 

Cumming-Bruce, Nicholas. "Austerity Comes to Thailand," Euro- 
money, May 1985, 211. 

Donner, Wolf. The Five Faces of Thailand: An Economic Geography. 
(The Institute of Asian Affairs, Hamburg.) New York: St. 
Martin's Press, 1978. 

Dowling, J.M. "The Supply Response of Rubber in Thailand," 
Southern Economic Journal, 45, January 1979, 795-805. 

"The Export Economy: 20 Years of Growth and Diversification; 
Where Do We Go From Here?" Bangkok Bank Monthly Review, 
No. 25, February 1984, 47-55. 

Fredericks, L.J., and R.J.G. Wells. "Some Aspects of Tenancy 
Reform Measures in Southeast Asia," Asian Survey, 18, No. 6, 
June 1978, 644-58. 

"Government Budget 1984," Bangkok Bank Monthly Review, No. 24, 
October 1983, 407-09. 

Grace, Brewster. The Politics of Income Distribution in Thailand. 
(American Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. Southeast 
Asia Series, 25, No. 7.) Hanover, New Hampshire: AUFS, 1977. 

Population Growth in Thailand. Part II: Population and Employ- 
ment (American Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. 
Southeast Asia Series, 22, No. 2.) Hanover, New Hampshire: 
AUFS, 1974. 

"Grass Roots Aids for Thai Farmers," Business Review [Bangkok], 
No. 11, June 1983, 43-45. 

"Growth of Industrial Sector in 1983 and Prospect for 1984," Busi- 
ness Review [Bangkok], No. 12, June 1984, 21-22. 

Hanson, James A. , and Craig R. Neal. Interest Rate Policies in Selected 
Developing Countries, 1970-82. Washington: World Bank, 1984. 

Ho, Robert, and E.C. Chapman (eds.). Studies of Contemporary 
Thailand. Canberra: Australian National University, Research 
School of Pacific Studies, 1973. 

Holtsberg, Christer Per. "Effects of a New Feeder Road on Unem- 
ployment and Income Distribution: A Case Study in Thailand," 
International Labour Review [Geneva], 118, No. 2, March- April 
1979, 237-49. 

Ingram, James C. Economic Change in Thailand, 1850-1970. Stan- 
ford: Stanford University Press, 1971. 



329 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Ishii, Yoneo (ed.). Thailand: A Rice- Growing Society. (Monographs 

of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University.) 

Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1978. 
"Japan's Overseas Investments (2): Thailand," Oriental Economist 

[Tokyo], 47, No. 819, January 1979, 49-59. 
Kunstadter, Peter, E.C. Chapman, and Sanga Sabhasri (eds.). 

Farmers in the Forest: Economic Development and Marginal Agriculture 

in Northern Thailand, Honolulu: East- West Center, 1978. 
"Labour and Unemployment: Objectives of the Sixth Five- Year 

Plan," Bangkok Bank Monthly Review, No. 24, November 1983, 

441-45. 

Laramee, Peter A. "Problems of Small Farmers Under Contract 
Marketing, with Special Reference to a Case in Chiengmai 
Province, Thailand," Economic Bulletin for Asia and the Pacific, 26, 
Nos. 2-3, September-December 1975, 43-57. 

Lin, Sein, and Bruce Esposito. "Agrarian Reform in Thailand," 
Pacific Affairs [Vancouver], 49, No. 3, Fall 1976, 425-42. 

Luther, Hans U. "Peasants and State in Comtemporary 
Thailand," International Journal of Politics [Hamburg], 8, No. 4, 
Winter 1978-79, 1-120. 

Mabry, Bevars D. "The Thai Labor Movement," Asian Survey, 
17, No. 10, October 1977, 931-51. 

Meesook, Oey Astra. "Income, Consumption, and Poverty in 
Thailand, 1962-63 to 1975-76." (World Bank Staff Working 
Paper, No. 364.) Washington: World Bank, 1979. 

Mudannayake, Ivan (ed.). Thailand Year Book, 1975-76. Bangkok: 
Temple Publicity Services, 1975. 

Murray, Charles A. A Behavioral Study of Rural Modernization: Social 
and Economic Change in Thai Villages. New York: Praeger, 1977. 

"New Forces in Thailand," Asian Finance, No. 11, April 1985, 
117-23. 

Ng, R.C.Y. "Development and Change in Rural Thailand," Asian 
Affairs [London], 10 (new series.) February 1979, 62-68. 

Nicol, Kenneth J., Somnuk Sriplung, and Earl O. Heady (eds.). 
Agricultural Development Planning in Thailand. Ames: Iowa State 
University Press, 1982. 

Nikom Chandravithun. "Labour Relations: Thailand's Experi- 
ence." Pages 281-85 in Vichitvong Na Pombhejara (ed.), Read- 
ings in Thailand's Political Economy. Bangkok: Bangkok Printing 
Enterprise, 1978. 

Prizzia, Ross. "The Labor Movement in Thailand: A Brief Over- 
view," Asia Quarterly [Brussels], No. 2, 1978, 93-108. 

Race, Jeffrey. "The Future of Thailand," Pacific Community 
[Tokyo], 8, No. 2, January 1977, 303-26. 



330 



Bibliography 



Randolph, R. Sean. "The Limits of Influence: American Aid to 
Thailand 1965-1970," Asian Affairs : An American Review, 6, No. 
4, March-April 1979, 243-266. 

Ravenholt, Albert. Milling Rice Makes the Difference. (American 
Universities Field Staff. Fieldstaff Reports. Southeast Asia Series, 
24, No. 1.) Hanover, New Hampshire: AUFS, 1976. 

"Repercussions of the Oil Price Decrease," Bangkok Bank Monthly 
Review, C 2A, April 1983, 159-74. 

Robinson, Warren C. "Economic Policy and Population Change 
in Thailand," World Development [Oxford], 6, Nos. 11-12, 1978, 
1261-69. "The Role of the Bank of Thailand in Providing Finan- 
cial Assistance to Priority Economic Sectors," Bank of Thailand 
Quarterly Bulletin, No. 23, June 1983, 27-39. 

Rubin, Herbert J. The Dynamics of Development in Rural Thailand. 
(Special Report No. 8.) De Kalb: Center for Southeast Asian 
Studies, Northern Illinois University, 1974. 

Sabatini, Omero. The Agricultural Economy of Thailand. Washing- 
ton: United States Department of Agriculture, Economic 
Research Service, January 1972. 

Saeng Sanguanroang. Development Planning in Thailand: The Role of 
the University. Singapore: Regional Institute of Higher Educa- 
tion and Development, September 1973. 

Silcock, T.H. The Economic Development of Thai Agriculture. Canberra: 
Australian National University Press, 1970. 

Srisilpavongse, Kanitha. "Privatisation: Dream or Reality?" 
Bangkok Bank Monthly Review, No. 26, April 1985, 79-182. 

Sternstein, Larry. Thailand: The Environment of Modernization. Sydney: 
McGraw-Hill, 1976. 

Sura Sanittanont. "The Role of Japanese Investment in Thailand." 
Pages 254-67 in Vichitvong Na Pombhejara (ed.), Readings in 
Thailand's Political Economy. Bangkok: Bangkok Printing Enter- 
prise, 1978. 

"The Thai Economy in 1983," Bangkok Bank Monthly Review, 
No. 25, March 1984, 87-102. 

"Thai-Japanese Relations," Business Review [Bangkok], No. 12, 
June 1984, 83-100. 

"The Thai-Korean Nexus," Business Review [Bangkok], No. 11, 
August 1983, 73-75. 

Thailand. Bank of. Annual Economic Report, 1986. Bangkok: 1986. 

Bank of. Department of Economic Research. Thailand: Eco- 
nomic Conditions in 1987 and Outlook for 1988. Bangkok: 1987. 

Bank of. Quarterly Bulletin. Bankgok: June 1983. 

National Economic and Social Development Board. 

External Assistance Requirements for the Fourth National Economic and 
Social Development Plan (1977-1981). Bangkok: March 1977. 



331 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Thailand. Office of the Prime Minister. National Economic and 
Social Development Board. Summary of the Fourth Five-Year Plan, 
1977-1981, Bangkok: n.d. 

. The Third National Economic and Social Development Plan 

(1972-1976). Bangkok: 1973. 

"Thailand: The Middle Way," Euromoney, October 1983, 345. 

"Thailand: Trade Unions Are Facing Formidable Problems," 
Financial Times [London], December 18, 1979, 32. 

Turton, Andrew. "The Current Situation in the Thai Country- 
side," Journal of Contemporary Asia [London], 8, No. 1, 1978, 
104-41. 

Unakul, Snoh. "Thailand's 'Growth Plus Four' Analogy," United 
Malaysian Banking Corporation Economic Review [Kuala Lumpur, 
Malaysia], 2, No. 19, 1983, 12-16. 

United States. Department of Labor. Bureau of International Labor 
Affairs. Country Labor Profile: Thailand. Washington: GPO, 1979. 

Department of State . Foreign Economic Trends and Their 

Implications for the United States: Thailand. (International Market- 
ing Information, No. 79-037.) Washington: GPO, March 1979. 

Vichitvong Na Pombhejara (ed.). Readings in Thailand's Political 
Economy. Bangkok: Bangkok Printing Enterprise, May 1978. 

Vijetbhakdi, Norani. "Eastern Seaboard Development Plan," 
Bangkok Bank Monthly Review, No. 25, April 1984, 140-87. 

Wang, K.P. Far East and South Asia (Mineral Perspectives, MP-1 .) 
Washington: United States. Department of the Interior, Bureau 
of Mines, 1977. 

Wibulswasdi, Chaiyawat. "Strategies and Measures to Maintain 
Thailand's Economic Stability in the 1980s," Bank of Thailand 
Quarterly Bulletin, No. 23, March 1983, 27-47. 

Williams, Llewelyn. Thailand, Current and Potential Crops: An Evalu- 
ation of Germplasm Requirements. Washington: United States 
Department of State, Agency for International Development, 
January 1974. 

Wong, John. ASEAN Economies in Perspective: A Comparative Study 
of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. 
Philadelphia: Institute for the Study of Human Issues, 1979. 

World Bank. Bangchak Oil Refinery Restructuring Project. Washing- 
ton: April 22, 1985. 

. Coal Development Potential and Prospects in the Developing Coun- 
tries. Washington: October 1979. 

Thailand: Coping with Structural Change in a Dynamic Econ- 
omy. Washington: December 23, 1980. 

. Thailand: Growth with Stability — A Challenge for the Sixth Plan 

Period — A Country Economic Report. Washington: June 5, 1986. 



332 



Bibliography 



. Thailand: Land Reform Areas Project. Washington: August 23, 

1982. 

. Thailand: Perspectives for Financial Reform. Washington: 

July 31, 1983. 

. Thailand: Rural Growth and Employment. (A World Bank 

Country Study.) Washington: 1983. 
. Thailand: Second Accelerated Rural Electrification Project. 

Washington: May 23, 1980. 
. Thailand: Second Agricultural Credit Project. (Staff Appraisal 

Report.) Washington: May 10, 1983. 

. The World Bank Atlas, 1985. Washington: 1985. 

. World Development Report 1986. Washington: 1986. 

(Various issues of the following periodicals were also used in the 
preparation of this chapter: Asia Research Bulletin [Singapore]; 
Bangkok Post [Bangkok]; Bank of Thailand, Monthly Bulletin 
[Bangkok], Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS) Southeast 
Asia Report; Quarterly Bulletin [Bangkok], and Statistical Bulletin 
[Bangkok]; Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong]; Standard Char- 
tered Review [London].) 



Chapter 4 

Alpern, Stephen I. "Insurgency in Northeast Thailand: A New 
Cause for Alarm," Asian Survey, 15, No. 8, August 1975, 684-92. 

Ampa, Santimatanedol. "Brainwave Idea for Way out of Politics 
Impasse?" Bangkok Post, May 8, 1987, 4. 

"Army Chief under Sharper Scrutiny," Bangkok Post, April 11, 
1987, 4. 

"Arthit Obeys His Orders," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 12, No. 14, 

April 6, 1986, 18-19. 
Bowring, Philip. "Shifts in Foreign Policy," Financial Times [Lon- 
don], December 18, 1979, 30. 
Burgess, John. "Despite Democratic Facade, Thai Military Retains 

Power," Washington Post, February 20, 1980, A22. 
Buszynski, Leszek. "Thailand and the Manila Pact," World Today 

[London], 36, No. 2, February 1980, 45-51. 
Caldwell, Malcolm. "Thailand: Towards the Revolution," Race 

and Class, 18, Autumn 1976, 129-53. 
Chadin, Tephaval. "Parliament is Stuttering Along, " Bangkok Post, 

January 1, 1987, 27. 
Chai-anan, Samudavanija. The Military in Thai Politics: The Young 

Turks and the Democrat Soldiers. Bangkok: Krungthep Bannakij, 

1983. 



333 



Thailand: A Country Study 



The Thai Young Turks. Singapore: Institute of Southeast 

Asian Studies, 1982. 

Chakrit, Noranitipadungkarn. Elites, Power Structure, and Politics in 
Thai Communities. Bangkok: National Institute of Development 
Administration, 1970. 

"Chavalit: Prem Still the Peoples' Choice: Premier 'as strong as 
ever'," Bangkok Post, May 21, 1987, 1. 

China in Thai Perspective: Research Report. (Asian Studies Monographs, 
No. 27.) Bangkok: Institute of Asian Studies, Chulalongkorn 
University, April 1980. 

"Civil Servants Viewed with Fearful Respect," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 132, No. 25, June 19, 1986, 44-48. 

"Coalition Mum on Chavalit's Charge," Bangkok Post, Febru- 
ary 16, 1987, 1. 

Darling, Frank C, "Political Functions of the United States 
Embassy in Thailand," Asian Survey, 18, No. 11, November 1978, 
1191-1207. 

. "Thailand in 1976: Another Defeat for Constitutional 

Democracy," Asian Survey, 16. No. 2, February 1977, 116-32. 

. "Thailand in 1977: The Search for Stability and 

Progress," Asian Survey, 18, No. 2, February 1978, 153-63. 

. "Thailand: Return to Military Rule," Current History, 71, 

December 1976, 197-200. 

Davies, Derek. "A right royal example: King Bhumibol Acts As 
a Catalyst for Progress," Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong 
Kong], 131, No. 4, January 23, 1986, 22-25. 

"Despite Strain, Thai-US Ties Still Strong," Bangkok Post, Novem- 
ber 7, 1986, 7. 

"Dr. Khien Offers a Thai Perspective on Indochina," Bangkok Post, 

November 13, 1986, 2. 
Evans, Grant. "Thai-Lao Relations: Three Villages Not Trade 

Is the Key," Nation [Bangkok], February 22, 1987, 11. 
"The Firing of Arthit," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 12, No. 23, June 8, 

1986, 17-18. 

Forbes, Andrew D.W. "Thailand's Muslim Minorities: Assimi- 
lation, Secession, or Coexistence?" Asian Survey, 22, No. 11, 
November 1982, 1056-73. 

Ghosh, Suchita. "Role of the Military in Thailand," Institute for 
Defence Studies and Analysis Journal [New Delhi], 10, No. 2, 
October-December 1977, 140-56. 

Girling, John L.S. "Is Small-holder Cultivation Viable? A Ques- 
tion of Political Economy with Reference to Thailand," Pacific 
Affairs [Vancouver], 59, No. 2, Summer 1986. 

. Thailand: Society and Politics. Ithaca: Cornell University 

Press, 1981. 



334 



Bibliography 



Grace, Brewster. A Note on Thailand: The Student Rebellion and Polit- 
ical Change. (American Universities Field Staff, Fieldstaff Reports. 
Southeast Asia Series, 22, No. 4.) Hanover, New Hampshire: 
AUFS, 1974. 

Gurevich, Robert. "Teachers, Rural Development, and the Civil 
Service in Thailand," Asian Survey, 15, No. 10, October 1975, 
870-81. 

Haas, David F. Interaction in the Thai Bureaucracy: Structure, Culture, 
and Social Exchange. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1979. 

Hong, Lysa. Thailand in 1984: Towards a Political Modus Vivendi. 
Page 319 in Lim Joo-Jack (ed.), Southeast Asian Affairs, 1985, Sin- 
gapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1985. 

Jackson, Kare D., and M. Hadi Soesastro (eds.). ASEAN Security 
and Economic Development. (Research Papers and Policy Studies.) 
Berkeley: Institute of East Asian Studies, University of Califor- 
nia, 1984. 

Jha, Ganganath. Foreign Policy of Thailand. New Delhi: Radiant Pub- 
lishers, 1979. 

Juree Vichit-Vadakan. "Thailand in 1984: Year of Administer- 
ing Rumors," Asian Survey, 25, No. 2, February 1985, 232-40. 
"Thailand in 1985: Year of Facing up to Facts," Asian 

Survey, 26, No. 2, February 1986, 174-85. 
Kasem, Udyanin, and Rufus D. Smith. The Public Service in Thailand: 

Organization, Recruitment, and Training. Brussels: International 

Institute of Administrative Sciences, 1954. 
Kershaw, Roger. "Thailand's Return to Limited Democracy," 

Asian Affairs [London], 10, Part 3, October 1979, 304-13. 
Keyes, Charles F. Thailand: Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State. 

Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1987. 
Khien, Theeravit. "Thai-Kampuchean Relations: Problems and 

Prospects," Asian Survey, 22, No. 6, June 1982, 561-76. 
Konthi, Suphamongkon. "Thailand's Democracy: The Sticky 

Experiment," Bangkok Post, July 7, 1987, 4. 
Kramol, Tongdhamachart. Toward a Political Party : Theory in Thai 

Perspective. (Occasional Paper, No. 68.) Singapore: Institute of 

Southeast Asian Studies, 1982. 
Krannich, Ronald L. Mayors and Managers in Thailand: The Struggle 

for Political Life in Administrative Settings. (Southeast Asia Series, 

No. 51.) Athens: Ohio University Center for International 

Studies, 1978. 

"The Politics of Intergovernmental Relations in 

Thailand," Asian Survey, 19, No. 5, May 1979, 506-22. 

"Kukrit: Plan for 'Revolution' Won't Succeed," Bangkok Post, 
April 2, 1987, 1. 



335 



Thailand: A Country Study 



"Kukrit Says Professional Premier Is Needed," Bangkok Post, 
December 11, 1986, 3. 

Lent, John A. "The Burnt-Out Candle: Thailand's Brief Press 
Freedom," Index on Censorship [London], 6, No. 4, July-August 
1977, 45-50. * 

Likhit Dhiravegin. The Bureaucratic Elite of Thailand: A Study of Their 
Sociological Attributes, Educational Backgrounds, and Career Advance- 
ment Pattern. Bangkok: Thai Khadi Research Institute, Tham- 
masat University, 1978. 

. Political Attitudes of the Bureaucratic Elite and Modernization in 

Thailand. Bangkok: Thai Watana Panich, 1973. 

. "Three Cardinal Principles for Thai-Japan Relations," 

Bangkok Post, December 17, 1986, 4. 

"Looking to Prem," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 12, No. 32, August 10, 
1986, 44-45. 

Luther, Hans U. "Peasants and State in Contemporary Thailand," 

International Journal of Politics [Hamburg], 8, No. 4, Winter 

1978-79, 2-119. 
Mabry, Bevars D. "The Thai Labor Movement," Asian Survey, 

17, No. 10, October 1977, 931-51. 
McBeth, John. "Arms for Peace: The US and Thailand Near an 

Accord on a Munitions Stockpile," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 131, No. 12, March, 20, 1986, 50-51. 
. "New Political Waters: Thai Voters Elect a Bizarre Mix 

of Powerful Men to Parliament," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 133, No. 35, August 28, 1986, 14-15. 
"Political Crossroads, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong 

Kong], 132, No. 25, June 19, 1986, 40-44. 
"Pre-emptive Strike: Prem Fires Arthit to Stop Army 

Meddling in Election, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong] , 

132, No. 23, June 5, 1986, 13-15. 
. "Prem-ature Election," Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong 

Kong], 132, No. 20, May 15, 1986, 12-13. 
McBeth, John and Paisal Sricharatchanya. "Awaiting a Call-up," 

Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 133, No. 32, August 7, 

1986, 10-11. 

. "Prem's Portfolio Power," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 133, No. 34, August 21, 1986, 12-13. 
Morell, David, and Chai-anan Samudavanija. Political Conflict in 

Thailand: Reform, Reaction, Revolution. Cambridge, Massachusetts: 

Oelgeschlager, Gunn and Hain, 1981. 
. "Thailand's Revolutionary Insurgency: Changes in 

Leadership Potential," Asian Survey, 19, No. 4, April 1979, 

315-32. 



336 



Bibliography 



Morrison, Charles E., and Astri Suhrke. Strategies of Survival: The 

Foreign Policy Dilemmas of Smaller Asian States. New York: St. 

Martin's Press, 1979. 
Neher, Clark D. The Dynamics of Politics and Administration in Rural 

Thailand. Athens: Ohio University, 1974. 
. "Move to Censure Prem 'May Spark a Coup'," Bangkok 

Post, March 20, 1987, 3. 
. "Political Forces in Thailand," Current History, 83, 

No. 497, December 1984, 418-21. 
. Politics and Culture in Thailand. (Politics and Culture Series.) 

Ann Arbor: Center for Political Studies, Institute for Social 

Research, University of Michigan, 1987. 
"Thailand in 1986: Prem, Parliament, and Political Prag- 
matism," Asian Survey, 27, No. 2, February 1987, 219-30. 
Neher, Clark D. (ed.). Modern Thai Politics: From Village to Nation. 

Cambridge, Massachusetts: Schenkman Publishing Company, 

1976. 

Niksch, Larry A. "Thailand in 1980: Confrontation with Vietnam 
and the Fall of Kriangsak," Asian Survey, 21, No. 2, February 
1981, 223-31. 

. "Thailand in 1981: The Prem Government Feels the 

Heat," Asian Survey, 22, No. 2, February 1982, 191-99. 

"No Star, But a Stirring Campaign Start," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 
12, No. 25, June 22, 1986, 22-23. 

"No United Front As Censure Date Nears, ' ' Bangkok Post, April 1 1 , 
1987, 5. 

"Once Again, It's Premier Prem," Asiaweek [Hong Kong], 12, 
No. 33, August 17, 1986, 19. 

"Opposition to Resubmit No-Confidence Motion," Bangkok Post, 
April 23, 1987, 1. 

Paisal, Sricharatchanya. "City on the Mend: Governor Chamlong 
Srimuang Brings Some Order to the Capital," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong] 134, No. 52, September 4, 1986, 
18-19. 

"Promise of the Good Life: A Plethora of Parties Offers 

Quick Fixes for a Sagging Economy, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review 
[Hong Kong], 133, No. 29, July 17, 1986, 36-37. 

"Queen Sirikit Helps Peasants Generate Extra Income," 

Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 131, No. 4, Janu- 
ary 23, 1986, 26-28. 

"Renewing Old Ties: Thai Visit to Lao Helps Improve 

Relations," Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 134, 
No. 51, December 18, 1986, 29-30. 



337 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Pauker, Guy J. "The ASEAN Energy Scene in Global Perspec- 
tive," Asian Survey, 19, No. 6, June 1979, 627-38. 

Phuangkasem, Corrine. Thailand's Foreign Relations 1964-80. 
(Occasional Paper, No. 74.) Singapore: Institute of Southeast 
Asian Studies, 1984. 

Pichai Chuensuksawadi, Banyat Tasaneeyavej , and Nattaya 
Chetchotiros. "Democracy, Army-Style?" Bangkok Post, March 13, 
1987, 4. 

Pike, Douglas. "Communist vs Communist in Southeast Asia," 

International Security, Summer, 1979, 20-39. 
Prachyadavi, Tavedikul. "Breakthrough in Indochina?" Bangkok 

Post, December 5, 1986, 4. 
"Soul Searching in Thai Foreign Policy," Bangkok Post, 

January 1, 1987, 28. 
"Prem Set to Face Challenge in House: Supporters Bid to Block 

Debate," Bangkok Post, April 21, 1987, 1. 
Punyaratabandhu-Bhakdi, Suchitra. "Thailand in 1982: General 

Arthit Takes Center Stage," Asian Survey, 23, No. 2, February 

1983, 172-77. 

. "Thailand in 1983: Democracy, Thai Style," Asian Sur- 
vey, 24, No. 2, February 1984, 187-94. 

Race, Jeffrey. "The January 1975 Thai Elections: Preliminary Data 
and Inferences," Asian Survey, 15, No. 4, April 1975, 375-81. 

"Thailand in 1974: A New Constitution," Asian Survey, 

15, No. 2, February 1975, 157-65. 

Ramsay, Ansil. "Tenancy and Landlessness in Thailand: How 
Severe a Problem?" Asian Survey, 22, No. 11, November 1982, 
1074-92. 

"Thailand 1978: Kriangsak— The Thai Who Binds," 

Asian Survey, 19, No. 2, February 1979, 104-14. 
. "Thailand 1979: A Government in Trouble," Asian Survey, 

20, No. 2, February 1980, 112-22. 
"Thailand: Surviving the 1980s," Current History, 86, 

No. 519, April 1987, 164-67. 
Randolph, R. Sean "The Limits of Influence: American Aid to 

Thailand, 1965-1970," Asian Affairs: An American Review, 6, 

No. 4, March-April 1979, 243-66. 
"Rangers Lay Siege to Kukrit's House," Bangkok Post, April 6, 

1987, 1. 

Richburg, Keith B. "Thailand's Army Chief Touches Off Debate: 
Call for Peaceful Revolution Draws Fire," Washington Post, 
April 16, 1987, A36. 

. "Thai Scandals Raise Army's Concerns," Washington Post, 

November 9, 1986, A28. 



338 



Bibliography 



The Royal Thai Government — A Directory 1982. Bangkok: Business 
Information and Research Company, 1982. 

"Rural Voters Support Individual, Not Parties," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 132, No. 25, June 19, 1986, 44-45. 

"Secret Fund: Army Prevails," Bangkok Post, December 13, 
1986, 4. 

Seah, Chee-Meow. "Student Activism and the Political Process 
of ASEAN Countries," Pacific Community [Tokyo], 7, No. 4, July 
1976, 551-66. 

Sermsuk, Kasitipradit. "Democrat Party Showdown," Bangkok Post, 

January 10, 1987, 4. 
. "Military in Move to Foil Censure Bid," Bangkok Post, 

April 14, 1987, 6. 
Siffln, William J. The Thai Bureaucracy: Institutional Change and 

Development. Honolulu: East-West Center Press, 1966. 
Simon, Sheldon W. "The ASEAN States: Obstacles to Security 

Cooperation," ORBIS, 22, No. 2, Summer 1978, 415-34. 
Somboom, Suksamran. Political Buddhism in Southeast Asia: The Role 

of the Sangha in the Modernization of Thailand. New York: St. 

Martin's Press, 1976. 
Somsakdi, Xuto, et al. Thailand in the 1980s: Significant Issues, 

Problems, and Prospects. Bangkok: Tura Institute, 1981. 
Somvichian, Kamol. "The Oyster and the Shell: Thai Bureaucrats 

in Politics," Asian Survey, 18, No. 8, August 1978, 829-37. 
Stifel, Laurence D. "Technocrats and Modernization in Thailand," 

Asian Survey, 16, No. 12, December 1976, 1184-96. 
Stuart-Fox, Martin. "Factors Influencing Relations Between the 

Communist Parties of Thailand and Laos," Asian Survey, 19, 

No. 4, April 1979, 333-52. 
Suhrke, Astri. "Loyalists and Separatists: The Muslims in Southern 

Thailand," Asian Survey, 17, No. 3, March 1977, 237-50. 
"Thailand: Politics as Usual," Current History, 77, 

No. 452, December 1979, 210-13. 
Surachai Sirikrai. "General Prem Survives on a Conservative 

Line," Asian Survey, 22, No. 11, November 1982, 1093-1104. 
Surin, Pitsuwan. "The Political Will, Military Might . . . and 

Democracy," Bangkok Post, October 20, 1986, 4. 
Thailand. Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand. (Certified correct 

English translation by Juridical Council. Document originally 

published in the Government Gazette, Vol. 95, Part 146, Spe- 
cial Issue, 1978). Bangkok: December 22, 1978. 
Office of the Prime Minister. Public Relations Depart- 
ment. Thai Government Organizational Directory, 1986, Bangkok: 

1986. 

. Thailand in Brief. Bangkok: August 1985. 



339 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Thak Chaloemtiarana. "Reflections on the Sarit Regime and the 

Process of Political Change in Thailand: Some Conceptual and 

Theoretical Reassessments," Southeast Asian Studies, 16, No. 3, 

December 1978, 400-10. 
Thailand: The Politics of Despotic Paternalism. Bangkok: 

Thammasat University Printing Press, 1979. 
Thawatt Mokarapong. History of the Thai Revolution: A Study in 

Political Behaviour. Bangkok: Chaalermnit, 1972. 
Theh, Chongkhadikij. "An Important Year for General Prem," 

Bangkok Post, January 1987, 27. 
. "Prasong Calls for Changes in Constitution," Bangkok 

Post, July 9, 1987, 1. 
"Prem Reveals Formula for National Success," Bangkok 

Post, March 4, 1987, 1. 
. "Siddhi Reveals Shift in Policy on Kampuchean Issue," 

Bangkok Post, August 14, 1986, 1. 
"Total Viet Withdrawal Unrealistic — Scientist," Bangkok Post, 

December 22, 1986, 3. 
Turton, Andrew, Jonathan Fast, and Malcolm Caldwell, Thailand: 

Roots of Conflict. Nottingham, United Kingdom: Bertrand Russell 

Home, 1978. 

United States. United States Information Agency. "Mass Media 
Usage in Bangkok 1984." (Research Memorandum.), Washing- 
ton: January 16, 1985. 

"Thai Use of Local Media for Foreign News' ' (Research 

Memorandum), Washington: April 2, 1985. 

Wilson, David A. The United States and the Future of Thailand. New 
York: Praeger, 1970. 

Wong, John. ASEAN Economies in Perspective: A Comparative Study 
of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. 
Philadelphia: Institute for the Study of Human Issues, 1979. 

Wyatt, David K. Thailand: A Short History. New Haven: Yale 
University Press, 1984. 

Yah, Lim Chong. "ASEAN's Internal Advances and External 
Unity," Asia Pacific Community [Tokyo], No. 6, Fall 1979, 31-43. 

Zimmerman, Robert F. "Insurgency in Thailand," Problems of Com- 
munism, 25, May-June 1976, 18-39. 

"Thailand 1975: Transition to Constitutional Democracy 

Continues," Asian Survey, 16, No. 2, February 1976, 159-72. 

(Various issues of the following periodicals were also used in the 
preparation of this chapter: Asian Recorder [New Delhi]; Asian Sur- 
vey; Bangkok Post; Christian Science Monitor; Deadline Data on World 
Affairs; Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong] ; Far Eastern Economic 



340 



Bibliography 



Review Asia Yearbook [Hong Kong]; Financial Times [London]; For- 
eign Broadcast Information Service Daily Reports: Asia and Pacific; Joint 
Publications Research Service (JPRS) Southeast Asia Report; Kees- 
ings Contemporary Archives [Edinburgh]; New York Times; Southeast Asian 
Affairs [Singapore]; Washington Post; Washington Star.) 



Chapter 5 

Alpern, Stephen I. "Insurgency in Northeast Thailand: A New 
Cause for Alarm," Asian Survey, 15, No. 8, August 1975, 684-92. 

"Insurgency in Thailand: An Analysis of the Government 

Response," Military Review, 55, No. 7, July 1975, 10-17. 

Ball, George W. "Thailand Next?" Washington Post, November 2, 
1979, A17. 

Barang, Marcel. "The Struggle for Hearts and Minds," Far Eastern 

Economic Review [Hong Kong], 96, No. 16, April 22, 1977, 13. 
Bowring, Philip. "Shifts in Foreign Policy," Financial Times 

[London], December 18, 1979, 30. 
"Thailand: Further Aid for Rural Areas," Financial Times 

[London], December 18, 1979, 29. 
Bowring, Philip, and Paisal Sricharatchanya. "Shaking the Pillars," 

Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 112, No. 26, June 19, 

1981, 38-43. 

Burgess, John. "Thais Turn to Bank Loans for Defense," Washing- 
ton Post, September 6, 1978, D3. 

Chai-anan Samudavanija. The Thai Young Turks. Singapore: 
Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1982. 

Chanda, Nayan. "Battles Along the Border," Far Eastern Economic 
Review [Hong Kong], 97, No. 32, August 12, 1977, 16. 

. Brother Enemy: The War After the War, A History of Indochina 

Since the Fall of Saigon. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 
1986. 

Clifford, W. "Science, Culture, and Criminal Justice in Asia," 
International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice, 2 , 
No. 2, Winter 1978, 191-205. 

Copeley, Gregory R. (ed.). Defense and Foreign Affairs Handbook 
1977-78. New York: Franklin Watts, 1978. 

Crozier, Brian (ed.). Thailand: The Dual Threat to Stability. (Con- 
flict Studies, No. 44.) London: Institute for the Study of Con- 
flict, 1974. 

Darling, Frank R. "Thailand." Pages 290-93 in Richard F. Staar 
(ed.), Yearbook on International Communist Affairs, 1979. Stanford, 
California: Hoover Institution Press, 1979. 



341 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Das, K. "Strife Among the Rebels," Far Eastern Economic Review 
[Hong Kong], 112, No. 19, May 1, 1981, 13-14. 

"Thailand: Transitional Military Rule?" Current History, 

73, No. 434, December 1978, 208-11. 

. "Operation People's War," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 96, No. 16, April 22, 1977, 10-12. 

Day, Booner. "U.S. in the Pacific: Overcommitted and Under- 
manned," A ir Force Magazine, No. 11, November 1979, 92-97. 

De Beer, Patrice. "History and Policy of the Communist Party 
of Thailand." Pages 143-57 in Andrew Turton, Jonathon Fast, 
and Malcolm Caldwell (eds.), Thailand: Roots of Conflict. 
Nottingham, United Kingdom: Spokesman, 1978. 

Dorey, Marcia A. and George J. Swidler, World Police Systems: A 
Factual Text. Boston: Northeastern University, 1975. 

Depuy, Trevor N., Grace P. Hayes, and John A.C. Andrews. The 
Almanac of World Military Power. New York: Bowker, 1974. 

Foreign Military Markets: South America/ Australasia. (Market Intelli- 
gence Reports.) Greenwich, Connecticut: Defense Marketing 
Service, 1979. 

Ghosh, Suchita. "Role of the Military in Thailand," Institute for 
Defence Studies and Analysis Journal [New Delhi], 10, No. 2, 
October-December 1977, 142-56. 

Goldstein, Carl. "Letter from Mae Salong," Far Eastern Economic 
Review [Hong Kong], 105, No. 33, August 17, 1979, 70. 

Gooi, Kim. "Letter from Aranyaprathet," Far Eastern Economic 
Review [Hong Kong], 105, No. 39, September 28, 1979, 86. 

"The Lure of Pol Pot' s Gold, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 105, No. 31, August 3, 1979, 32-33. 

Gua, Bo. "Opium, Bombs, and Trees: The Future of the H'mong 
Tribesman in Northern Thailand," Journal of Contemporary Asia 
[London], 5, No. 1, January 1975, 70-81. 

Gwertzman, Bernard. "A Vietnamese Drive Along Thai Border 
is Reported by U.S.," New York Times, January 31, 1980, Al. 

Haseman, John B. The Thai Resistance Movement During the Second 
World War. De Kalb: Northern Illinois University, 1978. 

Hatcher, Dave. "Rapprochement Under Fire," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 99, No. 1, January 6, 1978, 810. 

Ho Kwon Ping. "Thailand's Broken Ricebowl," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 102, No. 48, December 1, 1978, 
40-45. 

International Institute for Strategic Studies. The Military Balance, 

London: 1986, 170. 
Jane's Weapon Systems, 1985-86. London: Jane's Publishing, 1986. 



342 



Bibliography 



Kamm, Henry. "Thailand Steps Up Its Arms Purchases From 
U.S.," New York Times, January 6, 1980, 6. 

Keyes, Charles F. Buddhist Kingdom as Modern Nation-State. Boul- 
der, Colorado: Westview Press, 1987. 

Levine, Charles (ed.). Thailand. Singapore: APA Publications, 
1977. 

Lissak, Moshe. Military Roles in Modernization: Civil-Military Rela- 
tions in Thailand and Burma. Beverly Hills, California: Sage Pub- 
lications, 1976. 

Liu, Melinda. "The Triangle's Pecking Order," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 105, No. 37, September 14, 1979, 
38-40. 

Lobe, Thomas. United States National Security Policy and Aid to the 
Thailand Police. (Monograph Series in World Affairs, Graduate 
School of International Studies, 14, No. 2.). Denver: University 
of Denver, 1977. 

Lobe, Thomas, and David Morell. "Thailand's Border Patrol 
Police: Paramilitary Political Power." Pages 153-78 in Louis 
A. Zurcher and Gwyn Harries-Jenkins (eds.), Supplementary Mili- 
tary Forces: Reserves, Militias, Auxiliaries. Beverly Hills, Califor- 
nia: Sage Publications, 1978. 

Luther, Hans U. "Peasants and State in Contemporary Thailand," 
International Journal of Politics [Hamburg], 8, No. 4, Winter 
1978-79, 1-120. 

Marks, Thomas A. "The Military and Politics in Thailand: An 

Analysis of the Two October Coups (1976-1977)," Issues and 

Studies [Taipei], 14, January 1978, 58-90. 
McBeth, John. "Decline and Defection," Far Eastern Economic 

Review [Hong Kong], 118, No. 50, December 10, 1982, 15-16. 
"The Disappearing Army," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 131, No. 2, January 9, 1986, 30. 
"Hanoi's Troops Shift Inland, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 131, No. 20, March 15, 1986, 28. 
. "A Long, Tough March Towards Total Security," Far 

Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 132, No. 16, April 17, 

1986, 30-33. 

"Open-Arms Cache," Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong 

Kong], 132, No. 17, April 24, 1986, 44-46. 

"A Profile of the Young Turks' Camp," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 112, No. 26, June 19, 1981, 44-53. 

McBeth, John and Paisal Sricharatchanya, "The Coup Mentality," 
Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 130, No. 47, Novem- 
ber 28, 1985, 4-37. 



343 



Thailand: A Country Study 

Morell, David, and Chai-anan Samudavanija. "Thailand's Revolu- 
tionary Insurgency: Changes in Leadership Potential," Asian Sur- 
vey, 19, No. 4, April 1979, 315-32. 

Moritz, Frederic A. "Pol Pot Troops Slip In and Out of Thai Sanc- 
tuaries," Christian Science Monitor, November 28, 1979, 13. 

"Tough Thai Armor Forces Ready if Viets Attack This 

Month," Christian Science Monitor, December 3, 1979, 3. 

Morrison, Charles E., and Astri Suhrke, Strategies of Survival: The 
Foreign Policy Dilemmas of Smaller Asian States. New York: St. 
Martin's Press, 1979. 

Morrow, Michael. "Bases: Costly Legacy for Thais," Far Eastern 
Economic Review [Hong Kong], 92, No. 14, April 2, 1976, 40-43. 

Mudannayake, Ivan(ed.). Thailand Year Book 1975-76. Bangkok: 
Temple Publicity Services, 1975. 

Nations, Richard. "Thailand's Tactical Retreat," Far Eastern Eco- 
nomic Review [Hong Kong], 105, No. 27, July 6, 1979, 52-53. 

Noranit Setabutr, The Role of the Military in Thailand: 1958-1970, 
Bangkok: Praepittaya, 1971. 

"October 1976: The Coup in Thailand," (Special Supplement.) 
Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 9, No. 3, July- September 1977, 
2-51. 

Olsen, Edward A. and Stephen Jurika, Jr. (eds.). The Armed Forces 
in Contemporary Asian Societies. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 
1986. 

Paisal Sricharatchanya. "The Army Fights To Win the Cities of 

the Mind, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong] 119, No. 7, 

February 17, 1983, 18. 
"The Army's New Role," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 135, No. 8, February 19, 1987, 24-25. 
"How the Communists Crumbled in Two Years of Border 

War," Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 114, No. 42, 

October 9, 1981, 23-24. 
"A 'Lean, Mean Machine' , ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 135, No. 8, February 19, 1987, 26-27. 
. "Malaysian Reds Under Fire, ' ' Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 128, No. 20, May 23, 1985, 50-51. 
"The Muslims Move In," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 114, No. 42, October 9, 1981, 23. 
"Winning Hearts and Minds," Far Eastern Economic Review 

[Hong Kong], 135, No. 10, March 5, 1987, 38-40. 
Race, Jeffrey. "Thailand in 1974: A New Constitution," Asian 

Survey, 15, No. 2, February 1975, 157-65. 
Randolph, R. Sean. "The Limits of Influence: American Aid to 

Thailand, 1965-1970," Asian Affairs: An American Review, 6, 

No. 4, March-April 1979, 243-66. 



344 



Bibliography 



Richardson, Michael. "Keeping up the Momentum," Far Eastern 
Economic Review [Hong Kong], 99, No. 10, March 10, 1978, 16. 

Schneider, Robert J., Phon Sangsingkeo, and Serin Punnahita- 
nond. ' 'A Survey of Thai Student Use of Illicit Drugs, ' ' The Inter- 
national Journal of the Addictions, 12, February-March 1977, 
227-39. 

Somvichian, Kamol. "The Oyster and the Shell: Thai Bureaucrats 
in Politics," Asian Survey, 18, No. 8, August 1978, 829-37. 

Sorenson, Torkil, and John McBeth. "The Fast-ebbing Tide," 
Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 125, No. 29, July 19, 
1984, 28. 

Suhrke, Astri. "Loyalists and Separatists: The Muslims in Southern 

Thailand," Asian Survey, 17, No. 3, March 1977, 237-50. 
"Thailand: Politics as Usual," Current History, 74, 

No. 446, December 1979. 
Suwanwela, Charas, et al. "The Hill Tribes of Thailand: Their 

Opium Use and Addiction," Bulletin on Narcotics, 30, No. 2, 

April-June 1978, 1-19. 
Tanham, George K. Trial in Thailand. New York: Crane, Russak, 

1974. 

Thailand. Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand (Certified correct 
English translation by Juridical Council. Document originally 
published in Government Gazette, Vol. 95, Part 146, Special 
Issue, 1978), Bangkok: December 22, 1978. 

Thak Chaloemtiarana. Thailand: The Politics of Despotic Paternalism. 
Bangkok: Thammasat University, 1979. 

Thomas, M. Ladd. "The Malayan Communist Insurgents and 
Thai Malaysian Relations," Asian Affairs: An American Review, 
4, No. 6, July- August 1977, 371-84. 

United States. Congress. 92d, 2d Session. Senate. Committee on 
Foreign Relations. Subcommittee on U.S. Security Agreements 
and Commitments Abroad. Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia: Janu- 
ary 1972. (Staff Report.) Washington: GPO, May 8, 1972. 

Congress. 96th, 1st Session. House of Representatives. 

Committee on Foreign Affairs. Subcommittee on Asian and 
Pacific Affairs. Security and Stability in Asia: 1979. Washington: 
GPO, May 1979. 

Department of State. Cooperation in Combating Illicit Inter- 
national Traffic in Narcotics and Other Dangerous Drugs: Memorandum 
of Understanding Between the United States of America and Thailand 
(Signed at Washington September 28, 1971 . Treaties and Other 
International Acts, Series 7185.) Washington: GPO, 1971. 

General Accounting Office. Withdrawal of U.S. Forces from 

Thailand: Ways to Improve Future Withdrawal Operations. (Report to 



345 



Thailand: A Country Study 

the Congress by the Comptroller General of the United States.) 
Washington: GPO, November 1, 1977. 

' 'Thailand. ' ' Pages 424-3 1 in Report on Human Rights Prac- 
tices in Countries Receiving U.S. Aid. (Report submitted to the Com- 
mittee on Foreign Relations, United States. Senate, and 
Committee on Foreign Affairs, United States House of Represen- 
tatives, February 8, 1979.) Washington: GPO, 1980. 

Van der Kroef, Justus M. "Thailand: A New Phase in the Insur- 
gency?" Pacific Community [Tokyo], 8, No. 4, July 1977, 600-24. 

Weintraub, Peter, and David Lawton. "Thailand's Drug Trade 
Tangle," Far Eastern Economic Review [Hong Kong], 100, No. 17, 
April 28, 1978, 23-27. 

Wilson, David A. "The Military in Thai Politics," Pages 253-431 
in Johnson, John J. (ed.), The Role of the Military in Underdeveloped 
Countries. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962. 

Wyatt, David K. Thailand: A Short History. New Haven, Connec- 
ticut: Yale University Press, 1984. 

Zimmerman, Robert F. "Insurgency in Thailand," Problems of Com- 
munism, 25, May-June 1976, 18-39. 

(Various issues of the following periodicals were also used in the 
preparation of this section: Bangkok Post; Deadline Data; Far Eastern 
Economic Review [Hong Kong]; Far Eastern Economic Review Asia Year 
Book [Hong Kong]; Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily Reports: 
Asia and Pacific; Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS) Southeast 
Asia Report; Keesing's Contemporary Archives [Edinburgh]; The Mili- 
tary Balance [London]; New York Times; and Washington Post.) 



346 



Glossary 



baht (B) — Basic currency unit, divided into 100 satang. In 1984 
the value of the baht was tied to a basket of foreign currencies, 
including the United States dollar, that were significant to the 
Thai economy. The exchange rate per US$1 was B25.74 in 
September 1987. 

chaophraya — Traditional title given to the highest ranking official 
in the civil government. 

fiscal year (FY) — October 1 to September 30. 

General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) — A multilateral 
trade agreement signed at the Geneva Conference in 1947, 
which both sets out rules of conduct for international trade re- 
lations and provides a forum for multilateral negotiations on 
trade problems and the gradual elimination of tariffs and other 
trade barriers. 

gross domestic product (GDP) — The total value of goods and ser- 
vices produced within a country's borders during a fixed period, 
usually one year. Obtained by adding the value contributed 
by each sector of the economy in the form of compensation of 
employees, profits, and depreciation (consumption of capital). 
Subsistence production is included and consists of the imputed 
value of production by the farm family for its own use and the 
imputed rental value of owner-occupied dwellings. 

gross national product (GNP) — Gross domestic product {q. v. ) plus 
the income from overseas investments and wages, minus the 
earnings of foreign investors and workers in the home economy. 

Khmer Rouge — The name given to Khmer communists by Prince 
Sihanouk in the 1960s. Later (although a misnomer) it was 
applied to the Cambodian insurgents of varying ideological 
backgrounds who opposed the Khmer Republic of Lon Nol. 
Between 1975 and 1978 it also became an informal designa- 
tion for the regime of Democratic Kampuchea, whose leaders 
were the radical Pol Pot faction of the Kampuchean (or Khmer) 
Communist Party. After the Vietnamese invasion of Cambo- 
dia in December 1978, the Khmer Rouge became one of the 
three components of the Coalition Government of Democratic 
Kampuchea that contested the Vietnamese presence and the 
Hanoi-installed regime of the People's Republic of Kampuchea. 

khwan — Body-spirit or life-soul, generally thought to reside in the 
head; illness and death follow loss of the khwan. 

luang — Title of distinction designating that its bearer is in royal 
service. 



347 



Thailand: A Country Study 

nai — Literally, master. Lowest rank in the traditional nobility, the 
term is also used as a mark of respect for employers or any 
person of superior status. Under the sakdi na (q.v.) system, it 
identified its bearer as a landholder to whom labor service was 
due. Variant form is naaj. 

phi — General term for a variety of spirits believed to have power 
over human beings. Specific kinds of spirits may have partic- 
ular names. 

phra — Traditional princely title prefix designating that its bearer 
is a relative of the king; functional title given to holders of ranks 
in the civil administration below that oiphraya (q. v.); honorific 
for monks or persons and objects having religious associations. 

phrai — Generic term for commoners, variously translated as ser- 
vant, serf, or, incorrectly, as slave. The phrai was bound to 
the land in the service of a nai (q.v.) under the sakdi na (q.v.) 
system. 

phraya — Traditional princely title conferred on holder of second 
highest rank in the civil government and on viceroys of tribu- 
tary states. Sometimes seen as phrajaa or phya. 

sakdi na — Literally, sak (power in the sense of resources); na (paddy 
land). A system of social ranking originally based on the king's 
allocation of specific quantities of rice land to persons accord- 
ing to their rank, each such rank being defined in terms of so- 
called quality points (or dignity marks). The size of the allot- 
ment was closely associated with the number of persons owing 
labor service to an individual of a given rank; by the begin- 
ning of the Chakkri Dynasty in 1782, an individual's rank in 
the system was thought of primarily in relation to the number 
of persons owing him service, regardless of the amount of land 
he controlled. 

shifting cultivation — A traditional method of agriculture charac- 
terized by the rotation of fields rather than crops, the use of 
short cropping periods and long fallow periods, and the main- 
tenance of fertility by allowing natural vegetation to regener- 
ate on fallow land. Clearing of new or previously cropped land 
is often accomplished by cutting and burning vegetation. Also 
known as slash-and-burn or swidden agriculture. Thai term 
is tarn rai. 

Siam — Official name of the Thai kingdom from 1855 to 1939 and 
again from 1946 to 1949. Used conventionally in European 
sources from the late sixteenth century for the kingdom of 
Ayutthaya and later the kingdom of Bangkok, hence the term 
Siamese (q.v.) to describe their inhabitants. 



348 



Glossary 



Siamese — Inhabitants of Siam (q.v.). Historically used by Mon and 
Khmer to distinguish Tai (q.v.)- speaking settlers in the Chao 
Phraya Valley from those in other regions. The term was ex- 
tended in conventional usage to inhabitants of Siam. Between 
1939 and 1946 and since 1949, Thai (q.v.) and not Siamese 
has been employed to describe the dominant ethnic group of 
Thailand and Central Thai to denote the Thai of the Chao 
Phraya Valley. 

Sino-Thai — Term used by observers of Thailand for persons of 
Chinese and Thai ancestry. It does not apply to a clearly 
delineated, cohesive group; some such persons have been 
essentially assimilated into Thai society; others (usually with 
a recent Chinese forebear) have not. 

Tai — A family of languages spoken in Southeast Asia and southern 
China including Thai (q.v.); by extension the peoples speak- 
ing languages of that family. 

Thai — A national of Thailand; one or more persons of the (region- 
ally varied) ethnic group dominant in Thailand; the (dialecti- 
cally varied) language of the Thai people, one of several grouped 
in Tai (q.v.) family of languages; also used adjectivally. 

World Bank — Informal name used to designate a group of three 
affiliated international institutions: the International Bank for 
Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), the International 
Development Association (IDA), and the International Finance 
Corporation (IFC). The IBRD, established in 1945, has the 
primary purpose of providing loans to developing countries for 
productive projects. The IDA, a legally separate loan fund but 
administered by the staff of the IBRD, was set up in 1960 to 
furnish credits to the poorest developing countries on much eas- 
ier terms than those of conventional IBRD loans. The IFC, 
founded in 1956, supplements the activities of the IBRD 
through loans and assistance specifically designed to encourage 
the growth of productive private enterprises in the less devel- 
oped countries. The president and certain senior officers of the 
IBRD hold the same positions in the IFC. The three institu- 
tions are owned by the governments of the countries that sub- 
scribe their capital. 



349 



Index 



administrative law, 193 
administrative regions, 193, 194 
Agricultural Land Reform Act of 1975, 
152 

agricultural land reform program, 164 
Agricultural Land Rent Control Act of 
1974, 152 

agricultural sector, xv, xxv, 123; credit 
availability to, 129-30; effect of com- 
mercialization of, 87; employment in, 
xv, 132; expansion of, 144; increase in 
land requirements, 162, 164, 165; 
manufactured products of, xv, 139; in 
North region, 62; production of, xv, 46, 
155; tenancy in, 149-50 

AIDS, 115 

air bases, 252-53, 262-63 
airport, 174 

Airport Authority of Thailand (A AT), 
174 

air power: supplements to, 263 

Akha (Kaw) people, 75 

American troops. See military assistance; 

military bases; United States 
ammunition manufacture, 250 
Amnesty International, 116, 269 
Ananda Mahidol (Rama VIII), 27-28, 32 
Angkor, 7 

Anglo-Burmese War, 19 

animal husbandry, 160 

anticommunist policy (see also counterin- 
surgency operations; infrastructure de- 
velopment; military assistance; national 
security), 32, 38, 214; Anti-Communist 
Activities Act (1979), 269; Anti- 
Communist Act of 1933, 229; legisla- 
tion, 46, 269; in remote villages, 
230-31 

antimonarchist factions, 241 

armed forces (see also Royal Thai Air 
Force; Royal Thai Army; Royal Thai 
Marines; Royal Thai Navy), xviii; 
civic program participation of, 244; 
officer corps in, 246-47; rank struc- 
ture of, 265, 268; reliance for political 
stability on, 242; role in counter- 
insurgent actions, 243-44; strength of, 
239; structure of, 254-56; training 



programs and facilities of, 263-65; 

uniforms of, 265 
armies, private, 237 
army reserves, 246, 261 
Army Signal Corps, 201 
art, 113 

Arthit Kamlangek, 203-8, 255 
ASA. See Association of Southeast Asia 
(ASA) 

ASEAN. See Association of Southeast 

Asian Nations (ASEAN) 
assimilation: of Chinese people, xxvi, 80, 

91; of Mon people, 78-79; policy of, 70, 

80; of South Asian people, 81 
Association of Southeast Asia (ASA), 39, 

215 

Association of Southeast Asian Nations 
(ASEAN), 184, 215; support for Cam- 
bodian resistance groups, 235-36; 
Thailand as member, 45, 215 

automobile industry, domestic, 172 

Ay utthay a kingdom, xxi, 10-11, 13, 60; 
economic importance of, 15, 17; foreign 
trade of, 17 

Ayutthaya Thai. See Central Thai 

Bangkok: First Army headquarters in, 
257, 259; government of, 196; head- 
quarters of Royal Thai Air Force, 262; 
location of, 65; as major air traffic 
center, 174; as major port, 168, 173; 
population of, 67, 69 
Bangkok Entertainment Company, 201 
Bangkok Stock Exchange. See Security Ex- 
change of Thailand 
Bangkok Television Company, 201 
Bangkok-Thon Buri metropolitan area, 
46 

Bang Pakong, 179 

Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural 
Cooperatives (state-owned), 128, 130 
Bank of Thailand (central bank), 128, 142 
banks: commercial, 128, 130-31; foreign, 

125, 249-50 
Ban Pak Nam naval base, 262 
Ban Pho hydroelectric facility, 176 
Ban U Taphao, 252 



351 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Barisan Revolusi Nasional (National 

Revolutionary Front), 233 
barriers to trade: tariff and nontariff, 135; 

in Thailand, 138, 142-43 
beans, 155 

Bhichai Rattakul, 212 
Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama IX), xvii, 
32, 34, 43, 71, 183, 187; contributes to 
political stability, xxiv; in coup attempt 
(1981), 50; role in counterinsurgency, 
232; role in transition from dictatorship 
to democracy, 50 
Board of Investment, 142, 143-44 
Boonchu Rojanasathien, 213, 214 
Border Patrol Police (BPP), 239; civic 
activities of, 273-74; paramilitary 
nature of, 271-74; unit of TNPD, 
270 

border tensions {see also boundary 
disputes; Burma-Laos-Malaysia 
border; Thai-Cambodian border), 
Border Patrol Police and Volunteer 
Defense Corps actions in, 273-74; 
clashes over Thai-Laotian villages, 
221-22; Thahan Phran actions in, 
274; as threat to national security, 
233, 235; Vietnamese operations 
against Khmer, 236 

borrowing, foreign, 125 

boundary disputes: Thailand and Burma, 
60-61, 233, 237, 239; Thailand and 
Cambodia, 60-61, 235; Thailand and 
Laos, 60, 233 

Bowring Treaty, 20, 35, 155 

BPP. See Border Patrol Police (BPP) 

Buddhism. See Theravada Buddhism 

Buddhist monks: special position in so- 
cial structure, 84 

buffer state status, xxii-xxiii, 3-4, 23, 60 

bureaucracy {see also civil service), Chinese 
in, 84, 91-92; elite in, 90-91, 186; 
power channeled through Senate, 189; 
Thai of Chinese ancestry in, 91 

bureaucracy, government: as distinct so- 
cial class, 84 

Bureau of the Budget, 192 

Burma: boundary with Thailand, 60-61, 
233; conquers Ayutthayan kingdom, 
15; conquest by Great Britain of, 22; 
invades Thai territory, 18; people of, 
3; refugees from, 237; roads along 
boundary with, 237, 239 

Burma-Laos-Malaysia border, 237 



Burney Treaty, 19 

cabinet. See Council of Ministers 
Cambodia: communist control in, 45; in- 
fluence of French in, 22; relations with, 
184, 214, 217; shares disputed bound- 
ary with Thailand, 60-61 ; Siam agree- 
ment with France over, 23 ; Vietnamese 
control of government of, 235-36; with- 
drawal of Vietnamese troops from, 
xxviii 

Cambodians as refugees, 118-19 

canal system, 153, 154, 168, 171 

capital investment, foreign, 141 

capital market, 128-29 

Carter, Jimmy, 253 

cassava products, 124, 134, 135, 155, 158 

CAT. See Communication Authority of 

Thailand (CAT) 
censorship, 199-200 
Center (region): agriculture in, 146 
central bank. See Bank of Thailand 
Central Investigation Bureau: structure 

and activities of, 274-75 
Central Labor Court, 194 
Central Thai people, 57, 70-71; 

dominance of, 69; importance of dialect 

of, 71, 81 

Chakkri Dynasty, xxii, 3, 19-21, 57, 98 
Chamlong Srimuang, 206-7 
Chaobon people, 77 
Chao Phraya, Mae Nam (river), 4, 61, 

62-62, 154 
Chaovalit Yongchaiyut, 208, 209, 211, 

248, 261 

Chart Thai (Thai Nation) Party, xxvii, 

49, 51, 202, 203, 204, 209, 212 
Chatichai Choonhaven, xxvii, 212 
Chiang Mai University, 111-12, 202 
China {see also Thai-Chinese cooperation 
policy), diplomatic relations with, 45, 
52, 184, 215-16, 219-20, 227, 235; ef- 
fect on Thailand of communism in, 
214; invades Burma, 18; physical prox- 
imity to Thailand, 60; support for Thai 
communists, 230, 233; trade relations 
with, 135 

Chinese: assimilation into society of, xxvi, 
80, 91; in Ayutthayan social structure, 
14; discrimination against, 28; eco- 
nomic elite in social structure, 91; po- 
sition outside social structure, 84; 



352 



Index 



religious affiliation of, 83, 107; in 
Thailand, 25, 75, 80-81; two distinct 
groups in Thailand, 91 

Christians: discrimination against, 28; 
distribution in population of, 108-9 

Chulachomkhlao Royal Military Acad- 
emy, 202-4, 264 

Chulalongkorn (Rama V), xxii, 4, 240; 
formalizes sangha structure, 98; in- 
troduced individual land ownership 
concept, 148; reforms of, xxiii, 21-22, 
276 

Chulalongkorn University, 109 
cities, 67 

civil aviation, xvii 
civil service, 197-98 
Civil Service Act of 1928 (amended 1954), 
246 

Civil Service Commission, 192, 197 
climate, xiv, 65 

clothing manufacture and export, 140 
Cobra Gold, 253 
Cochinchina, 22 
coconut plantations, 65 
coffee, 160 

commercialization of agriculture, 87 

commodities: change in volume of export 
of primary, 134; export of surplus 
agricultural, 144 

commonality: as binding force, xxi, xxv; 
as defense against communism, 230; of 
Islam for Malay states, 11; of patron- 
client relations, 59; ofTai language, 69; 
of Theravada Buddhism, 59-60, 69 

communes, xvii, 194, 195-96 

Communication Authority of Thailand 
(CAT), 179 

communist movement, 229; influence of, 
46; insurgency, 41, 61 

Communist Party of Thailand (CPT): 
depletion of, 232-33; external support 
for, 230; formation and outlawing of, 
229; insurgent elements of, 228; subver- 
sive and recruitment activity of, 229-30 

Community Action (Kit Prachakhorn) 
Party, 209, 213, 214 

conscription {see also army reserves; man- 
power), 244-45 

Constituent Assembly, 40 

constitution (1978), 49, 183; provisions 
for service in armed forces, 244-45; 
provisions of, 185-86; rights and 
guarantees in, 185 



Constitutional Front, 32 
constitutional government, 241 
Constitutional Tribunal, 194 
constitutions: of 1949, 34; of 1968, 40; of 

1932, 26-27; of 1974, 44 
constitutions, interim: of 1960, 37; of 

1972, 42 
construction, 139 
Cooperation Party, 32 
core Thai. See Central Thai; majority of 

population 
cotton, 155 

Council of Ministers, 191-92 

counterinsurgency operations: under 
Anti-Communist Activities Act (1979), 
269-70; assistance from United States 
for, 251; external, xxiii, 237, 239; in- 
ternal, xxiii, 230-32, 239 

countervailing duties, 138 

coup (1932), 26-27, 241, 276 

coup (1947), 33 

coup (1951), 34, 242 

coup (1957), 37, 254 

coup (1971), 42 

coup (1976), 152, 231, 268 

coup (1977), 201, 206 

coup attempt: 1981, 50, 183, 202-3; 
1985, 183, 205-6 

Coup d'Etat Group, 33 

court language (Phasa Ratchasap), 71 

Court of Appeal, 194 

court system, 193-94 

CPT. See Communist Party of Thailand 
(CPT) 

credit availability: to agricultural sector, 

129-30; to industry, 130 
crime rate, 281 

Criminal and Civil Procedures Code 

(1935), 276 
Criminal Court, 194 
criminal law: administration of, 278-80; 

Criminal Code of 1956, 277-78; focus 

on narcotics trade in, 284; history and 

development of, 275-77 
crisis management, 192 
crop production. See agricultural sector 
current account balance, 125, 133-34, 

221 



dairy products, 161 

debt, external, 125, 138-39 

defense capabilities, 218 



353 



Thailand: A Country Study 



defense industry, domestic, 250-51 

defense spending, xviii, 248-51 

deficit: current account, 125, 133-34; 
domestic, 125 

Democratic Kampuchea, 52 

Democratic People's Republic of Korea 
(North Korea): Thailand seeks relations 
with, 215-16 

Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North 
Vietnam): support for Thai com- 
munists, 230, 233; Thailand seeks re- 
lations with, 215-16 

Democrat (Prachathipat) Party, xxvii, 32, 
33, 40, 44-45, 50, 51, 202, 203, 205, 
209, 211-12; in partisan politics, 206 

Department of Central Intelligence, 192 

detente with China, xxiii 

Dhammayuttika sect, 98, 103 

dharma, 100, 103 

dialects of four regions, 71-73 

districts, xvii, 194, 195 

Don Muang Air Base, 263-65 

drama, 113 

drug trade. See narcotics trade; opium- 
heroin trade 



Eastern Seaboard Development Program, 

xxv, 141-42, 173 
economic aid. See United States; World 

Bank 

economic cooperation, 45 

economic development: Fifth Economic 
Plan, 124; First Economic Develop- 
ment Plan (1961-66), 154; as integra- 
tion policy, 239; plans in 1961 for, 38; 
Sixth Development Plan (1987-91), 
192; of Thanom administration, 40 

economic growth: contribution of indus- 
trial sector to, 139; effect of shift in mer- 
chandise exports on, 135; levels of, 
xxiv-xxv, xxviii, 123-24 

economic policy: infrastructure develop- 
ment, xv, 239; integration policy as, 
237, 239; private sector orientation of, 
123; rice-based (1955), 34-35 

education: acceleration of literacy, 
109-10; based on European methods, 
109; economic importance of, 95; ex- 
pansion of facilities for, 94; inequitable 
access to, 110; of monks, 95; reforms 
of Chulalongkorn (Rama V), 22; 
universality in Thailand of, xv 



EEC. See European Economic Commu- 
nity (EEC) 

EGAT. See Electricity Generating 
Authority of Thailand (EGAT) 

Ekkalak Thai (Thai identity), 57 

elections, parliamentary, 27, 189; of 1969, 
40; of 1975, 44; of 1988, xxvii 

Electricity Generating Authority of 
Thailand (EGAT), 175, 176, 179 

electric power industry: buys electricity 
from Laos, 222; electrification projects, 
38; hydroelectric power, 154, 175-76; 
privately owned sector of, 178; state- 
owned enterprises of, 176 

electronics, 124 

elephants, 160, 164 

employment: in agriculture, 132, 144; 

growth in, 132, 133; in industry, 132; 

in manufacturing subsector, 140 
energy sources {see also hydroelectric 

power; lignite; natural gas; oil), xv- 

xvi 

Esso Standard of Thailand, 178-79 

ethnic groups, xiv, 69 

European Economic Community (EEC), 

124, 135 
exchange system, labor, 87 
executive branch. See Council of Ministers 
export competitiveness, 134 
exports, 124; change in composition of, 

134; crops as, 155; increase in volume 

of manufactured goods, 140; shift in 

destination of, 134-35 
extraterritoriality system, 276 



Family Planning Services, 69 

family unit, rural, 86 

fighter aircraft, xviii, 263 

finance: industrial, 130-31; rural, 129-30 

finance companies, 128, 130-31 

First Economic Development Plan 

(1961-66), 154 
fiscal policy {see also taxation), 125-26 
fishing industry {see also marine products), 

73, 161-62 
fluorite mining, 168 
FMS. See Foreign Military Sales (FMS) 

credits 
footwear, 134 

foreign exchange {see also current account 

balance), 134 
foreign investment, xxviii, 40, 141 



354 



Index 



Foreign Military Sales (FMS) credits, 
251, 254; increase after 1976, 253 

foreign policy, 45; effect of sending troops 
in World War I, 241; flexibility of, 
xxviii, 215, 222-23; objectives of, xviii, 
184, 235; toward Laos, 221, 221-22; 
toward United States, 124, 135, 220; 
toward Vietnam, 184, 218 

foreign trade: composititon of, xvi, 140; 
importance of, 123-24; with newly in- 
dustrializing countries (NICs), 135; in 
reign of Mongkut, 20-21; trading part- 
ners in, xvi, 134-35 

Forest Industry Organization, 164 

forests {see also reforestation; teak indus- 
try), 62; destruction by farmers of, 162, 
164, 165; reduction of, xv, 162; state 
ownership of, 162 

fowl production, 161 

France: effect of imperialism, 22; support 
by Thailand for Indochina campaign, 
34; treaty revision with, 241 

freedom of the press, 199-200 

Free Thai Movement, 30, 31 

fruit, 134, 155 

Funan state, 5, 7 

furniture, 134 



GATT. See General Agreement on Tariffs 

and Trade (GATT) 
gem industry, 167 

General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 
(GATT): effect of Tokyo Round of, 135 

geography, xiii; diversity of regions, 62 

Girling, John L. S., 204 

Golden Triangle, 75, 282 

government, xvii; agencies for indus- 
trial policy, 142; interdependence with 
sangha of, 104-5; interim, 1947, 33 

government bond repurchase market, 129 

Government Housing Bank (state- 
owned), 128 

Government Savings Bank (state-owned), 
128 

Great Britain {see also Bowring Treaty; 
Burney Treaty), 17-18, 20; effect of 
imperialism, 22; treaty revision with, 
241 

gross domestic product, 124; ratio of 

agriculture to total, 144 
Group of Nineteen, 213-14 
guerrilla activity, 41 



guerrilla radio station. See Voice of the 
People of Thailand (VOPT) 



Harn Linanond, 206 

health {see also public health), xv, 113-15 

heterogeneity: of lower urban social stra- 
tum, 92-93; of urban middle class, 92 

highway system, national, 172 

hill people: Akha (Kaw), 75; Hmong 
(Meo, Miao), 75, 77, 115-16, 147; in- 
surgent elements of, 228; Karen, 70, 
74, 75, 146; Lahu (Mussur) people, 75; 
languages of, 76; Lisu (Lisaw), 75, 147; 
Mien (Yao), 75, 77 

Hindu religion: coexistence with Bud- 
dhism, 7; influence on Mon people, 7; 
rites for birth, death, and marriage, 102 

Hindus, 81, 109 

Hmong (Meo, Miao) people, 75, 77, 147; 
migration to Thailand of, 115-16 

homogeneity of society, xxi, xxv, 69 

Hong Kong, 135 

household network, rural, 86-87 

House of Representatives: role in Na- 
tional Assembly of, 189-90 

housing, 114, 123 

human capital as national asset, xxi, xxv 
human rights organizations, 116, 269 
hydroelectric power facilities, 154, 175-76 



IFCT. See Industrial Finance Corporation 

of Thailand (IFCT) 
imperialism, 22 
imports, 124 
independence, 3-4, 23 
Indonesia, 135 

industrial development plans, 141-42 

Industrial Finance Corporation of 
Thailand (IFCT), 128, 130, 142 

industrial policy, 142-44 

Industrial Restructuring Committee, 142 

industrial sector: contribution to eco- 
nomic growth, xv, 139 

infiltration, military, 235; actions of Bor- 
der Patrol Police (BPP) in, 273-74 

inflation, 49, 132 

infrastructure development, xv, 239 
insurgent activity {see also revolutionaries), 
decrease by mid- 1987, 233; increase 
after 1965, 231; as threat to national 
security, 228 



355 



Thailand: A Country Study 



integrated circuits, 134 

integration policy, 237, 239 

intelligence network: of Border Patrol 
Police (BPP), 273 

Internal Security Operational Command 
(ISOC), 231 

International Coffee Organization, 160 

investment {see also capital investment; for- 
eign investment), incentives for, 
143-44; rate of, _ 124-25 

irrigation: projects, 38, 153; system, 62, 
153-55 

Isan. See Thai- Lao 

Islam, 5; incidence in Thailand of, 96; 
practice of, 107; Shia Islam in minor- 
ity, 107; Sunni Islam among majority, 
107 

Islamic law, 193 

ISOC. See Internal Security Operational 

Command (ISOC) 
Italy, 250 



Jakarta Informal Meeting, xxviii 
Japan, 17; assistance for naval repair fa- 
cilities, 250; diplomatic relations with, 
184; economic influence of, 42; invest- 
ment in Thailand, 40, 141; relations 
during World War II with, 29-30; re- 
lations of Phibun regime with, 28-29; 
trade barriers for rice in, 135; trade re- 
lations with, 124, 135, 221 
jewelry, 134 

Johnson, Lyndon B., 41, 215 

Joint United States Military Assistance 

Group (JUSMAG), 252 
joint ventures. See capital investment; for- 
eign investment 
Judicial Service Commission, 193 
judicial system (see also court system), xvii, 
193 

Juree Vichit-Vadakan, 205 
JUSMAG. See Joint United States Mili- 
tary Assistance Group (JUSMAG) 

Kampuchea. See Cambodia; Democratic 

Kampuchea 
Karen (Kariang, Yang) people, 70, 74, 

146; in highlands, 75 
karma, 99-101 
Kasetsart University, 111 
kenaf, 159 



Kennedy, John F., 39 
Khao Khor base, 232 
Khmer people, xxi, 3, 70, 74-75; in 

Mekong River Valley, 7; migration to 

Thailand of, 78, 115-16 
Khmer Peoples National Liberation Front 

(KPNLF), 235 
Khmer People's Revolutionary Armed 

Forces (KPRAF), 236 
Khmer resistance groups: support by 

Thailand and ASEAN of, 235-36; 

Vietnamese operations against, 236 
Khmer Rouge: military support by China 

for, 235; recognition by Thailand, 217; 

support by Thailand of, 235 
Khmu people, 77 
Khorat Plateau, 5, 72, 147 
Khorat Thai people, 74 
Khuang Aphaiwong, 30-31 
king: historic role in military decisions, 

240-41; role in government of, 183, 

185, 186-87; in Thai society, 13 
KPNLF. See Khmer Peoples National 

Liberation Front (KPNLF) 
KPRAF. See Khmer People's Revolution- 
ary Armed Forces (KPRAF) 
Kriangsak Chomanand, 49, 183, 202, 

203-4, 210, 255 
Kui (Soai) people, 77 
Kukrit Pramoj, 45, 47-48, 212 

labor exchange. See exchange system 

labor force: changing composition of, 
132-33; exchange system in rural areas, 
87; percentage in agriculture, xv, 144; 
regional growth in, 133; unions, 58 

Laem Chabang, 173 

Lahu (Mussur) people, 75 

land: availability for agriculture, 144; in- 
crease in value of, 59; shortages of, 
83-84 

landless peasants, 58-59, 75, 88, 152 

land ownership: desire by peasants for, 
58-59; introduction of concept of in- 
dividual, 148; land code for, 148; value 
in social structure of, 87 

land reform, 151-52 

Land Reform Areas, 152-53 

land use, 146-47 

languages (see also non-Tai-speaking 
minorities; Tai-speaking minorities), 
xiv, xxvi, 69-75 



356 



Index 



Lao people: migration to Thailand of, 
115-16; numbers in Thailand, 116; ori- 
gin, 9 

Lao People's Liberation Army. See Pathet 
Lao 

Laos: closeness of Thai-Lao people to, 
72, 81-82; communist control in, 45; 
concern of Thailand for situation in, 
40; diplomatic relations with, 184, 
214,216-17,221; presence of Pathet 
Lao in (1962), 39, 216-17; roads along 
boundary with, 237, 239; sells electric- 
ity to Thailand, 222; shares disputed 
boundary with Thailand, 60; trade 
agreement with, 52; trade policy with, 
221-22 

Laotian force incursions, 244 

League of Nations, 25 

legal system {see also criminal law), 

193-94; history of, 275-76; penal code 

in, 276; reforms, 276 
legislation, 190 
Leninists, 233 

lignite extraction and use, 176 
Likhit Dhiravegin, 197-98, 206 
Lisu (Lisaw) people, 75, 147 
literacy rate, 72, 112 
literature, 112-13 

loans, foreign: for military equipment, 

249-50 
Lop Buri, 17 

lower class: in urban social structure, 
92-93 

Lua (Lawa) people, 77, 146 

Luang Plaek Phibunsongkhram. See 

Phibunsongkhram (Phibun) 
Lue people, 74 

Mae Klong, Mae Nam (river), 154 
Mae Nam Chao Phraya. See Chao 

Phraya, Mae Nam (river) 
Mae Nam Mae Klong. See Mae Klong, 

Mae Nam (river) 
Mae Nam Pattani. See Pattani, Mae Nam 

(river) 

Mahanikaya sect, 98, 103 

Mahayana Buddhists: Chinese in 

Thailand as, 83 
Mahidol University, 1 1 1 
maize, 124, 134, 135, 155, 156, 158 
majority of Thai people, 69-70; divided 

into four groups, 70; language of, 70 



Malay Peninsula, 4, 5; control by Great 
Britain of, 22; differences of people 
from Thai majority, 5, 7, 70, 74, 82; 
problems of people, 82-83 

Malaysia: joins Thailand in ASA, 39; 
shares boundary with Thailand, 60; 
trade relations with, 135 

Malaysian Communist Party (MCP): in- 
surgency of, 231 ; insurgent elements of, 
228 

Manila Pact (1954), 214, 220, 227 
Manoon Rupekakorn, 203, 205 
manpower, 244 
manufactured products, 134 
manufacturing firms: importance and 

focus of, 139-42; location of, 140-41; 

state-owned, 141 
Maoists, 233 
Mapthaphut, 173, 179 
marine products, 134, 161 
martial law, 268 

Mass Communications Organization of 

Thailand, 199, 201 
mass media, 198-99 
Mayaguez incident, 45 
MCP. See Malaysian Communist Party 

(MCP) 

MEA. See Metropolitan Electricity Author- 
ity (MEA) 

Mekong River system, 7, 60, 61, 62 

Meo tribesmen, 41, 216-17 

metal products, 134 

Metropolitan Electricity Authority 
(MEA), 175, 176 

Metropolitan Police: Training School, 
275; unit of TNPD, 270, 274 

Miao-Yao language, 77 

middle class, 92, 94 

Mien (Yao) people, 75, 77 

migration, 46, 59; of Hmong and 
Mien people, 77, 115-16; of Khmer 
people, 78; in and out of Central 
region, 70; from southern China, 4; 
of various Indochinese groups, 115; 
of Vietnamese to Thailand, 79-80, 
115-16 

military assistance {see also Foreign Mili- 
tary Sales (FMS) credits; Military As- 
sistance Program (MAP — ; agreement 
with China (1987), 220; agreement 
with United States, 34, 218, 227, 228, 
242; from United States (1950-87), 
253-54 



357 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Military Assistance Program (MAP) of 
United States, 242, 251; decline after 
1976 in, 253 

military bases, American, 252-53 

military budget. See defense budget 

military equipment: loans from private 
foreign banks for, 249-50; supplied by 
United States, 249 

military establishment {see also officer 
corps; Rassadorn Party), effect of 
Western influence on, 241-42; elite in, 
90-91; historic foundation for, 240; in- 
creased professionalism of, 239-40; 
kings instrumental in development of, 
241; power of supreme commander of 
armed forces, 254; role in Thai politics 
of, 183-84, 201-9, 212; strong position 
in Thai society, 243; supervision by 
Ministry of Defense, 255; Thai of 
Chinese ancestry in, 91 

military junta (1976), 268 

military officer class, 241 ; in armed forces, 
246-48, 259; extraordinary involve- 
ment in politics and business, 242-43; 
Young Turks faction, 247-48 

Military Service Act, 245, 254 

military uniforms, 265 

mining (see also gem industry; tin mining 
and production; tungsten mining and 
production; zinc mining and produc- 
tion), xv, 139, 165-68; illegal, 166-67 

Ministry of Defense, 240-41, 255 

Ministry of Finance, 142 

Ministry of Industry, 142 

Ministry of Interior, 278 

Ministry of Justice, 193, 278 

minority groups, xxvi, 70 

modernization, xv, 21-22, 123; costs of, 
58; in reign of Bhumibol, 82 

monarchy (see also king), 13, 185 

monetary policy, 127-28 

money market, 128-29 

Mongkut (Rama IV), xxii, 4, 240; in- 
terest in Western relations of, xxii, 
xxiii, 20; sangha reforms of, 98, 276 

Mon-Khmer language, 77, 78 

monkhood, 84, 93, 103-4 

Mon people, 3; in central plains and 
Burma, xxi, 7, 75; effect on sangha of 
migration of, 98; influence on Thai cul- 
ture of, 78; integration of, 79; subdued 
by Burmese and Khmer, 7 

mortality rates, 113-14 



Mother Earth Goddess, 102 

motion picture industry, 113 

motor vehicles, 172-73 

Muang Thai (Land of the Free), or 

Thailand, xxiii 
Multifiber Arrangements, 135 
municipalities, xvii, 196 
Muslim groups, 107-8 
Muslim separatists: decline in insurgent 

activity, 231-33; insurgent elements of, 

228 



Nakhon Phanom, 252 

Nakhon Ratchasima: air base, 252, 263; 

Second Army headquarters in, 257 
Nakhon Si Thammarat: Fourth Army 

headquarters in, 257 
Nam Phong, 252 
Nanchao state, 9-10 
Nang Klao (Rama III), 19-20 
Narai (king of Ayutthaya kingdom), 

17-18 

Narai (king of Siam), 71 

NARC. See National Administrative Re- 
form Council (NARC) 

NARC orders (see also martial law; stu- 
dent demonstrations), 268, 269 

narcotics (see also opium-heroin produc- 
tion), attempts to quell trade, 283-84, 
285; organized crime in trade of, 281; 
production, 115, 147, 282; social sta- 
tus of dealers in, 93; trade along Bur- 
mese border, 237; use in population of, 
115, 284 

Narcotics Suppression Center, 284 

Naresuan (king of Ayutthayan kingdom), 
15, 240 

Narong Kittikachorn, 42 

Narong Wongwon, 213 

National Administrative Reform Coun- 
cil (NARC), 48, 268 

National Assembly, 187-90 

National Broadcasting Services of 
Thailand, 201 

National Council for Muslims, 108 

National Democracy (Chart Prachathi- 
patai) Party, 204, 205 

National Economic and Social Develop- 
ment Board, 142, 192 

National Executive Council military junta 
(1971), 42 

nationalism, 23, 25, 28, 32, 45 



358 



Index 



National Operations Center, 192 
national police, 244 

national security {see also martial law), col- 
lective security policy for, 227; current 
status, xxviii; effect of Vietnamese 
invasion of Cambodia on, 259; flexibil- 
ity in matters of, 228; internal pro- 
tection for, xxvii, 228-33; methods to 
ensure public order, 268; problems of, 
228; promise of assistance for, 220; pro- 
tection from external threats, 233-39; 
Vietnamese-Cambodian question 
threatens, 218-19 

National Security Council, 192, 255 

National Socialist Party, 37 

National Union (Sahachat) Party. See 
Rassadorn Party 

national unity, 3 

natural gas, 175, 179 

naval air component, Royal Thai navy, 
261 

naval bases, 262 

naval repair facilities, 250 

Nawa Phon (New Force) movement, 47, 
48, 268 

the Netherlands, 17, 135 

newly industrializing countries (NICs): 
Thailand enters this category, xxv; as 
trading partners with Thailand, 135 

newspapers, 198, 200; Chinese-language, 
200-201; English-language, 200 

NICs. See newly industrializing countries 
(NICs) 

nirvana, 100-101 

Nixon, Richard M., 215 

nobility in social structure, 90-92 

non-Tai-speaking minorities, 74-75, 81 

North (region): agricultural tenancy in, 
150-51; agriculture in, 145, 147; econ- 
omy of, 72 

Northeastern Thai. See Thai-Lao 

Northeast region: agricultural tenancy in, 
151; agriculture of, 144-46; economy 
of, 72 

Northern Thai people, 70; closeness to 

Laos, 72 
Nung, 9 

Office of the Prime Minister, 192, 

198-99, 201 
officer corps: in armed forces, 246-48, 

259; Young Turks faction in, 247-48 



Offshore Mining Organization (OMO), 
166-67 

oil {see also petroleum products), as fuel 
source, 175-76; import of, 124; indus- 
try, 178 

oilseeds, 155 

opium-heroin industry, 75, 77, 147, 282; 

participants in, 282-83 
OSS. See Office of Strategic Services 

(OSS) 

Pakistanis, 107 

Pak Mai (New Party), 222 

Paleolithic culture, 4 

paramilitary groups: Red Gaurs (Red 

Bulls), 47, 48, 268; Village Scouts, 47, 

48, 50 

party politics. See political system 
Pathet Lao, 39 

patron-client relations, 59, 85, 89-90, 94 
Pattani, Mae Nam (river), 155 
Pattani National Liberation Front, 41 
Pattani United Liberation Organization 

(PULO): insurgency of, 231 
Pavie, Auguste, 23 

PEA. See Provincial Electricity Authority 

(PEA) 
peasants, 58-59, 87-88 
penal system, 280-81 
People's Party, 27 

People's Republic of China. See China 
People's Republic of Kampuchea {see also 

Cambodia), 52, 61; attacks against 

refugee camps by, 118 
Petroleum Authority of Thailand, 179 
petroleum products, 178 
Pham Van Dong, 52 
Phangnga naval base, 262 
Phaulkon, Constantine, 17-18 
Phibunsongkhram (Phibun), 26-30, 

32-33; anticommunist position, xxiii, 

33 

Philippines: joins Thailand in ASA, 39; 

trade relations with, 135 
Phitsanulok: Third Army headquarters 

in, 257 
Phuan, 74 
Phuket, 173, 176 
Phumiphon Dam, 154, 175 
Phutai people, 74 
pineapples, 155, 159 
pipelines, natural gas, 179 



359 



Thailand: A Country Study 



Planned Parenthood Association of 
Thailand, 69 

Police Education Bureau, TNPD, 275 

Police Officers Academy, 275 

political parties: development of sys- 
tem for, 202; legalized, 40; legisla- 
tion to broaden party participation, 
210-11 

political system: changes in, 44-45; 
development of party politics in, 
212; role of military in, 183-84, 
201-9, 212; role of military in main- 
taining stability, 242; stability of, 
xxiv, 183, 202 

population distribution, xiv, 65, 67 

population growth, 46, 59; effect on em- 
ployment of, 132; effect on forest acre- 
age of, 162, 164, 165 

ports, xxv, 168, 173 

Portugal, 17 

Potter, Jack M., 85 

Prachakorn Thai (Thai People) Party, 
205, 209, 213 

Prajadhipok (Rama VII), xxiii, 25-26 

Pramarn Adireksan, 204-5 

Prem Tinsulanonda, 49, 183-84, 
201-203, 253; achievements as prime 
minister, xxiv; coalition cabinets of, 
201-5, 207, 209; as director of ISOC, 
231; rise in power of, 255 

prices, domestic: controls for, 143; deter- 
mination of, 132; effect of oil price rise, 
132; increases in, 49, 132 

Pridi Phanomyong, 26-27, 30-32 

prime minister (see also Office of the Prime 
Minister), role and power of, 185, 191, 
254-55; selection of, 191 

privatization planning, 141, 192 

processed food, 134 

prostitution: health problems of, 115; so- 
cial status of, 93 

protection, trade, 135, 138, 142, 143 

provinces, xvii, 65, 194; division of, 194; 
government of, 194-95 

Provincial Electricity Authority (PEA), 
176 

Provincial Police: authority of, 271; unit 
of TNPD, 270 

Provincial Police training centers, 275 

public health, 113-14 

Puey Ungphakorn, 106 

PULO. .fePattani United Liberation Or- 
ganization (PULO) 



quarrying, 139 
quotas, import, 135 

radio stations and broadcasting, 198, 201 
Radio Thailand, 201 
railroad system, xvi, xxv, 22, 171-72 
Ramathibodi, 10-11 
Ramathibodi II, 3, 240 
Ramkhamhaeng (Rama the Great), 10 
Ramkhamhaeng University, 111, 112 
Ramsay, Ansil, 202 
Rangers, 239 

Rassadorn (People) Party, xxvii, 209, 212 
Red Gaurs (Red Bulls), 47, 48, 268 
reforestation, 164 

refugee camps, 116, 118; attacks against, 
118 

refugee policy, (see also 1 repatriation pol- 
icy), 116, 118, 235 
refugees (see also infiltration, military); 
from Burma, 237; from Cambodia, 52, 
216, 235; from Laos, 216-17; shelter 
and resettlement of, 116-120; from 
Vietnam, 116, 216 
regional differences, xiv, 69, 71-72 
religion, xiv, 96-109, 104, 106 
religious boundary, 5 
religious language (Pali), 71 
repatriation policy for refugees, 116, 118 
Republic of Korea (South Korea), 135 
reserve forces. See army reserves 
resettlement: policy of integration, 239; 

of refugees, 118-19 
revolutionaries, 233 

rice: export of, 124, 134; trade barriers 
for, 135; as war reparation, 31 

rice cultivation, 3, 4-5, 65; basis for de- 
velopment of centers of commerce, 60; 
dry, 155-56; by Mon people, 78; trans- 
formation in, 15-17, 155; upland, 147; 
volume of production of wet, 155; wet, 
xxii, 9, 60, 61, 62, 155-56 

Rice Goddess, 102 

rice premium, 34-36, 46, 156 

road building, 237, 239 

road system, xvi, 172-73 

rock salt, 168 

Royal Fleet, 261 

Royal Irrigation Department, 154 
Royal Thai Air Force, 174, 239, 252; 

command structure of, xviii, 262; 

counterinsurgency actions of, 262; 



360 



Index 



responsibilities of, 244; training and 
service academy of, 264-65 
Royal Thai Armed Forces, xxiii 
Royal Thai Army, 239; counterinsurgent 
actions of, 257; effect of Vietnamese in- 
vasion into Cambodia on, 259, 261 ; or- 
ganizational structure of, xviii, 257, 
259; regional army commands of, 257; 
training and service academy of, 
263-64, 265 
Royal Thai Marine Corps, 239, 261 
Royal Thai Naval College, 264 
Royal Thai Navy, 239; air component of, 
261; combat forces of, 261-62; develop- 
ment after World War II, 261 ; respon- 
sibilities of, 244; training and service 
academy of, 264-65 
Ruam Thai (Thai Unity) Party, 209, 213 
rubber: exports, 124, 134, 135; produc- 
tion, 65, 73, 155, 156; products, 134, 
135, 139-40 
rural areas {see also exchange system; 
family unit; household networks; land 
ownership), development program as 
anticommunist policy, 230-31; popu- 
lation of, 67; social structure in, 83-84, 
85-90 
Rusk, Dean, 39 

Rusk-Thanat agreement (1962), 214-15, 
220, 227 

Saek people, 74 

Saiyud Kerdphon, 253 

Samak Sundaravej, 213 

samsara: in Theravada Buddhism, 99-100 

sangha: ceremonies affecting, 103; con- 
duit for social mobility, 95; interde- 
pendence with government of, 104-5; 
Mahanakaya sect, 98, 103; reforms by 
King Mongkut of, 98; role in Ther- 
avada Buddhism of, 97-98; role under 
Chakkri Dynasty of, 98; sects of, 103; 
special social status of, 93 

Sangha Law: of 1902, 98; of 1963, 103 

sanitation policy, 114; district committee, 
196-97; rules as non-tariff barriers, 135 

Santi Nimitr (Dream of Peace) teams, 239 

Sanya Dharmasakti, 43-44 

Sarit Thanarat: administration in 1960 of, 
37-38; anticommunist stance of, 229; 
effect of his coup of 1957, 254; moder- 
nization plans of, 38 



Sattahip, xxv, 173, 252-53, 262 

savings rate, national, 125 

schools: government and private, 110; Is- 
lamic, 108 

SEATO. See Southeast Asia Treaty Or- 
ganization (SEATO) 

Second Indochina War (1954-75), xxiii, 
72, 119, 227; United States action in, 
252 

securities industry, 128 

Security Exchange of Thailand, 129 

security organizations, local, 239 

Senate, 187, 189-90 

Seni Pramoj, 30, 31-32, 44, 48, 211 

SET. See Security Exchange of Thailand 

Shan people, 9, 74 

shipping, xvi-xvii, 173-74 

Siam, xxii, 4; as buffer state, 3-4, 23; 

economy of, xxii; name changed to 

Thailand, 28, 33 
Siam Electric Company, 175 
Siddhi Savetsila, 212, 221 
Sihanouk, Prince Norodom, 52, 235 
Sikh people in Thailand, 81, 109 
Singapore, 135 
Sino-Tibetan language, 77 
Si Racha, 173 
Sirikit Dam, 154, 176 
Sirikit, Queen, 187 
slavery, 21 

Small Industry Finance Corporation of 
Thailand (state-owned), 128 

Social Action (Kit Sangkhom) Party, 
xxvii, 45, 49, 50, 51, 202, 203, 205, 
209, 212 

social mobility: diminution of, 93, 96; op- 
portunities for, 93-96 

social structure: in Ayutthayan society, 
13-14; emergence of new middle group 
in, 58; erosion of distinct classes in, 84; 
power of ruling class in, 90; rural pat- 
terns of, 85-90; urban patterns of, 
90-96 

soil quality, 146-47 

Songkla, 173 

sorghum, 155 

South Asian people, 81 

South (region): agricultural tenancy in, 
151; economy of, 73 

Southeast Asia Collective Defense Treaty 
(1954), 34, 39 

Southeast Asia Treaty Organization 
(SEATO), 34; dependence on, 227; 



361 



Thailand: A Country Study 



members of, 214; phasing out of, 
216 

Southern Thai, 70 
Soviet Union, 184, 220-21 
spirit (phi) beliefs, 101-2 
squatters and land reform, 153 
Srivijaya Empire, 5 

state-owned enterprises, 123, 126-27, 
192, 198 

State Railway of Thailand (SRT), 171 
student demonstrations: catalyst for de- 
velopment of party politics (1973), xxiii, 
210; against government (1973), 42-43, 
44, 48-49; suppression of (1976), 268 
subsidies as nontariff barriers, 135 
Suchinda Kraprayoon, 246 
sugar, 124, 134, 135, 155, 158 
sugarcane production, 155, 158-59 
Sukhothai kingdom, 9-10 
Sukhothai Thammathirat University, 112 
Summit Industrial Corporation, 178 
supreme commander of armed forces (see 
also prime minister), check on power 
through retirement system, 254; power 
of, 254; responsibilities of, 255 
Supreme Court, 194 
surveillance capability, (BPP), 273 
syam people, 3 

TAC. See Thai Airways Company (TAC) 

Tai Dam (Black Tai), 9 

Tai Dam people: migration to Thailand 

of, 115-16 
Tai Deng (Red Tai), 9 
Tai Khao, 9 

Tai language, 3, 60; four major groups 
speaking, 70; Tai-speaking minorities 
of, 74 

Tai Nung people, 115-16 

Tai peoples, xxi, 3; origin in China of, 

9; in present-day Vietnam, 9 
Tai-speaking minorities (see also non-Tai- 

speaking minorities), 74; Khorat Thai, 

74; Phutai people, 74 
Tai-speaking minority: Lue people, 74; 

Phuan people, 74; Saek people, 74; 

Shan people, 74 
Taiwan: investment in Thailand of, 40, 

141; trade relations with, 135 
Ta Khli air base, 250, 252, 263 
Taksin, 3, 18-19 
Tambiah, S. J., 97 



Tambralinga (Nakhon Si Thammarat), 5 

tariff rates, 138, 142-43 

taxation, 125-26 

tax farming, 80 

teak industry, 62, 164-65 

technical assistance, 34, 228 

telecommunications, xvii, 179-80 

Telephone Organization of Thailand 

(TOT), 179 
television stations and broadcasting, 198, 

201 

TEMCO. See Thailand Exploration and 

Mining Company (TEMCO) 
tenancy, agricultural, 149-53 
Teochiu dialect, 81 

territory loss and regain, 23, 25, 29, 30 
textiles: effect of trade barriers on, 135, 

138; export of, 124, 134; importance in 

manufacturing of, 140 
Thahan Phran, 274 
Thai Airways Company (TAC), 174 
Thai Airways International (THAI), xvii, 

174 

Thai-Cambodian border, 52; armed 
warfare along, 118; conflict along, 
235-37; Vietnam and Cambodian force 
garrisons, 237 

Thai-Chinese cooperation policy, 235 

Thai Citizens' Party, 49 

Thai Interarms joint venture, 250 

Thailand: name changed to Siam (1946), 
33; new name for Siam, 28 

Thailand Exploration and Mining Com- 
pany (TEMCO), 141 

Thailand National Police Department 
(TNPD), 270; Narcotics Suppression 
Center of, 284; Police Education 
Bureau of, 275 

Thailand Oil Refining Company 
(TORC), 178 

Thai-Lao people, 70-72, 81-82; problems 
in Thailand of, 81-82 

Thai News Agency, 199 

Thai people of Chinese ancestry, 91 

Thai Royal Academy, 71 

THAISARCO, 166 

Thai-style democracy, 183, 184, 248 

Thai Tobacco Monopoly, 159 

Thammasat University, 111 

Thanat Khoman, 39 

Thanin Kraivichien, 48-49, 210, 268 

Thanom Kittikachorn, 37; coup, 42; suc- 
ceeds Sarit, 39 



362 



Index 



Theravada Buddhism, xxi, 3; dharma, 
100, 103; groups adherent to, 96; in- 
troduced by Singhalese, 7, 97; karma, 
99-101; nirvana, 100-101; role of king 
in, 97-98; samsara, 99-100; Tipitaka, 
97-100 

Thienchai Sirisamphan, 212 

Thon Buri, xxi, 18 

Tibeto-Burman language, 77 

timber production, 162, 164-65 

tin: export of, 124, 166; mining and 

production, 65, 73, 166-67, 176 
Tin people, 77 

Tipitaka: Theravada Buddhist scriptures, 
97, 98; three-part doctrine of, 97-100 

TNPD. See Thailand National Police 
Department (TNPD) 

tobacco, 155, 159 

topography, xiii-xiv, 61 

TORC. Thailand Oil Refining Com- 
pany (TORC) 

TOT. See Telephone Organization of 
Thailand (TOT) 

tourism, xxviii, 65, 134 

trade barriers, 135, 138, 142, 143 

trade relations: with Laos, 221-22; with 
United States, 220 

Trailok (king of Ayutthayan kingdom), 
13-14, 240 

Treaty of Friendship and Commerce. See 
Bowring Treaty 

Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation 
(1978), 228 

tungsten mining and production, 167 

Udon Thani, 252 

UNHCR. See United Nations High Com- 
missioner for Refugees (UNHCR) 
Union of Democratic Thai, 269 
unions, 133 

United Democracy (Saha Prachathipatai) 
Party, xxvii, 203, 209, 212, 213 

United Nations High Commissioner for 
Refugees (UNHCR), 116 

United Nations (UN): action in Korea 
supported by Thailand, 33; outcome of 
conference on Cambodia (1981), 219 

United States: assistance for highway de- 
velopment from, 172; counterinsurgen- 
cy assistance of, 231, 253; Foreign 
Military Sales (FMS) credits, 251; in- 
vestment in Thailand of, 40, 141; Mili- 



tary Assistance Program (MAP) of, 
242; military bases in Northeast region, 
72, 252; military exercises of, 253; mili- 
tary personnel in Thailand, 45; pledge 
of military assistance of, 214-15; rela- 
tions with, 184; supplies military equip- 
ment, 249; supported by Thailand, 34; 
technical assistance of, 228, 250; trade 
relations with, 124, 135, 220 

United States Office of Strategic Services 
(OSS), 30 

United Thai People's Party, 40 

universities, 110-12 

urbanization, 58, 59, 123; effect and 
problems of, 114; effect of rapid, 67 
utilities, public, 139 

Vajiravudh (Rama VI), 241 
VDC. See Volunteer Defense Corps 
(VDC) 

Vietnam: descendants of Tai people in 
present-day, 9; effect of invasion in 
Cambodia by, 259; invades Democratic 
Kampuchea (1978), 52, 218, 253; phys- 
ical proximity to Thailand, 60; relations 
with, 184, 218 

Vietnamese forces: increased deployment 
along Thai border (late 1980s), 236; in- 
cursions into Thailand, 219, 244; threat 
of proximity in Cambodia, 233, 235 

Vietnamese migration pattern, 79-80, 
115-16 

village government, xvii, 194, 196 
Village Scouts (Luk Sua Chaoban), 47, 
48, 50 

violence, 42-43, 47, 48, 58 

Vitoon Yasawas, 206 

Voice of the People of Thailand (VOPT), 

230, 233 
voluntary export restraints, 135 
Volunteer Defense Corps (VDC): adjunct 

of BPP, 273-74 
VOPT. See Voice of the People of 

Thailand (VOPT) 

wage rate, 133 
war reparations, 31 

war reserve weapons: pool, 253; stockpile, 
220 

wot: ceremonies in, 102-3; in rural social 
structure, 85-86, 87, 96 



363 



Thailand: A Country Study 



water supply (see also irrigation), 114; con- 
trol system, 153-54; pollution of parts 
of, 162 

waterways (see also canals), xvi, 168, 171 
weapons pool. See war reserve weapons 
pool 

Weinberger, Caspar, 253 

Western influence, xxii, 21-22, 28, 33; 
effect on military establishment of, 
241-42; on legal system, 275-76 

Winchester Arms Company, 250 

wood as fuel, 175 

World Bank: assistance for highway de- 
velopment from, 172; financial as- 



sistance for railway system, 171; finan- 
cial assistance from, 154; loans for 
natural gas exploitation, 179 

World War I, 25, 241 

World War II, xxiii, 29-30 



yams, 155 

Yot Fa (Rama I): contributions of, 19 
Young Turks, 202-3, 205, 247-48 



zinc mining and production, 168 



364 



Published Country Studies 



(Area Handbook Series) 



550-65 


Afghanistan 


550-153 


Ghana 


550-98 


Albania 


550-87 


Greece 




Algeria 


7ft 

ju— / o 


Guatemala 


550-59 


Angola 


550-174 


Guinea 


550-73 


Argentina 


550-82 


Guyana 


550-169 


Australia 


550-151 


Honduras 


550-176 


Austria 


550-165 


Hungary 


■^n 17^ 


Bangladesh 


550-21 




550-170 


Belgium 


550-154 


Indian Ocean 


550-66 


Bolivia 


550-39 


Indonesia 


550-20 


Brazil 


550-68 


Iran 


550-168 


Bulgaria 


550-31 


Iraq 


DDU-Dl 


Burma 


JJU-iJ 


Israel 


550-37 


Burundi/Rwanda 


550-182 


Italy 


550-50 


Cambodia 


550-30 


Japan 


550-166 


Cameroon 


550-34 


Jordan 


550-159 


Chad 


550-56 


Kenya 


550-77 


Chile 


550-81 


Korea, North 


J JU uu 


China 


550-41 


J\UICd, OLJU.IJ.1 


550-26 


Colombia 


550-58 


Laos 


550-33 


Commonwealth Caribbean, 


550-24 


Lebanon 




Islands of the 






550-91 


Congo 


550-38 


Liberia 


550-90 


Costa Rica 


550-85 


Libya 


550-69 


Cote d'lvoire (Ivory Coast) 


550-172 


Malawi 


550-152 


Cuba 


550-45 


Malaysia 


550-22 


Cyprus 


550-161 


Mauritania 


550-158 


Czechoslovakia 


550-79 


Mexico 


550-36 


Dominican Republic/Haiti 


550-76 


Mongolia 


550-52 


Ecuador 


550-49 


Morocco 


550-43 


Egypt 


550-64 


Mozambique 


550-150 


El Salvador 


550-88 


Nicaragua 


550-28 


Ethiopia 


550-157 


Nigeria 


550-167 


Finland 


550-94 


Oceania 


550-155 


Germany, East 


550-48 


Pakistan 


550-173 


Germany, Fed. Rep. of 


550-46 


Panama 



365 



j jyj- 


- 1 OD 


Paraguay 


550- 


-185 


Persian Gulf ! 


550- 


-42 


Peru 


550- 


-72 


Philippines 


550- 


-162 


Poland 


30U- 


1 Q1 
-101 


Portugal 


550- 


-160 


Romania 


550- 


-51 


Saudi Arabia 


550- 


-70 


Senegal 


550- 


-180 


Sierra Leone 


550- 


-1 84 


Singapore 


550- 


-86 


Somalia 


550- 


-93 


South Africa 


550- 


-95 


Soviet Union 


550- 


-179 


Spain 


500- 


-96 


Sri Lanka 


550- 


-27 


Sudan 


550- 


-47 


Syria 


550- 


-62 


Tanzania 


550- 


-53 


Thailand 



550-89 Tunisia 

550-80 Turkey 

550-74 Uganda 

550-97 Uruguay 

550-71 Venezuela 

550-32 Vietnam 

550-183 Yemens, The 

550-99 Yugoslavia 

550-67 Zaire 

550-75 Zambia 

550-171 Zimbabwe 



irU.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1989 -0- 242-444 (00014) 



366 



i 



PIN: 004217-000 



